Rich Malloy \<rmalloy@greateryellowstone.org\>

12/20/2005 01:39 PM To

Group Ow-Docket@EPA

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Subject

Draft MSGDP comments Attention Docket ID No. OW-2005-0007

Please find attached comments to the draft Multi-Sector General
Stormwater

Discharge Permit.

> 20 December, 2005

Water Docket

Attention Docket ID No. Ow-2005-0007

Environmental Protection Agency, (4101T

1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW.

Washington, DC 20460

Re: Comments on draft NPDES Multi-Sector General Permit for Storm-water
Discharges

1)  Inclusion of selenium benchmark monitoring for sector J, SIC code
    1475 mining facilities, as exists for sector G mining facilities.

2)  Maintain established benchmark monitoring schedule.

3)  Clarification needed to delineate seeps and adit drainage from
    storm-water discharge at mining waste sites.

The Greater Yellowstone Coalition (GYC) appreciates the opportunity
comment on this draft NPDES general permit for storm-water discharges
from industrial activities. The Greater Yellowstone Coalition is a 501
(c) (3) non-profit conservation organization with 13,000 members is
devoted to the conservation and health of the Greater Yellowstone
Ecosystem encompassing some 18 million acres, which includes Yellowstone
and Teton National Parks, 6 national forests, 3 national wildlife
refuges, other public lands, and approximately 3 million acres of
private lands.

1\. Of great concern to the GYC are the selenium impacts generated by
phosphate mining SIC code 1475 facilities located in region 10's
southeast Idaho. Nearly half of the U.S. phosphate reserves lie in a
central area where the states of Montana, Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho are
conjoined. Within these phosphate rock bearing formations (Phosphoria),
selenium occurs naturally and is highest in the Meade Peak Member of the
Phosphoria formation.[^1] Selenium, a listed section 313 toxic chemical,
is present as relatively insoluble forms within the formation though is
transformed into the soluble forms of selenite and selenate when exposed
to weathering and oxidation in open pit mining processes. These mobile
forms of selenium occur from weathered mining wastes and are transported
into the environment through water runoff

and infiltration of water.[^2] Appreciable selenium concentrations from
waste rock piles are known to occur widely throughout the phosphate
production area in southeast Idaho.[^3] The effects of storm-water
runoff can be seen in the streams in the phosphate mining resource area.
For example, in 2005, East Mill Creek produced water samples that
measured 417 µg/L Se during the spring runoff, and 103µg/L Se in the
summer after heavy flows from melt-off had subsided.[^4] Thus the
problems occurring from selenium pollution to southeast Idaho and the
Salt River drainage in western Wyoming can be attributed, in large part,
to storm-water discharges from these SIC code 1475 facilities covered
under Sector J of the Multi-Sector General Permit.

The issue of selenium contamination has been ongoing for at least twelve
years, and was brought to the public's attention when a half dozen
horses and hundreds of sheep died from selenium contaminated water and
forage on reclaimed waste rock piles.[^5] This public awareness has
prompted the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare to conduct several
health consults and has resulted in one fish consumption advisory.[^6]
These large amounts of selenium released to the environment by phosphate
mining operations pose significant risks to the aquatic ecosystems of
the Blackfoot River in Idaho and the upper Salt River in Wyoming.
Between 1997 and 2003 thirty-one separate streams and rivers were
sampled for Se in the Blackfoot and Salt River drainages in the
phosphate-mining field. Samples included; water, sediment, aquatic
plants, invertebrates, and fish. All of the streams but three exhibited
a high percentage of samples in each of the above mediums that exceeded
the "levels of concern" for selenium, published by the U.S. Department
of Interior in 1998.[^7] In 2005 seven of those streams were re-sampled.
Three fish were collected from each stream totaling twenty-one samples.
Of those twenty-one fish, seventeen exceeded the proposed EPA standard
maximum of 7.91 g/g selenium dry weight criterion established to protect
aquatic life.[^8] Recent aquatic invertebrate sampling reviewed by a
representative of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service prompted one to
state, "we managed to discover aquatic invertebrates with the highest
level of selenium (788 ppm) ever reported from much more intensive and
extensive sampling across the western U.S."[^9]

Knowing that selenium is severely impacting the environment and that it
is also transported by storm water drainage, the GYC questions why
benchmark testing for selenium is not included as a requirement for
sector J mining facilities. We notice that under J.7 in Table J-1, the
only benchmark monitoring requirement for SIC code 1475 facilities is
TSS or total suspended solids. This seems woefully inadequate,
especially when the EPA has considered the effects of selenium
contamination for mining operations that fall under sector G of the same
permit. Looking on page 70 of the draft permit on Table G-2, the EPA has
established a benchmark monitoring limit of .005 mg/L for selenium along
with limitations for nine other elements that pose pollution risks by
sector G mining facilities. Why would the EPA consider selenium a risk
for sector G facilities and not sector J when phosphate mining
facilities consistently release quantities in excess of the selenium
benchmark established for sector G. The impacts of selenium
contamination created by phosphate mining dictate that sector J, 1475
facilities need be benchmark monitored for selenium.

Since the phosphate mining selenium contamination issue was made public,
the phosphate mining companies have employed the Best Management
Practice (BMP) of "selective handling" and consider it an "adequate
response" [^10] to contain future selenium releases. This, however, is
tempered by their admission that "with the on-going selenium
investigations . . . all the BMPs needed have not yet been
identified."[^11] Further, column-leaching tests of this BMP expect
seepage to continue at levels of 81g/L.[^12] This is a level sixteen
times greater than EPA's established standards pertaining to drinking
water and protection of aquatic life established at 5g/L. Employing
"selective handling," ground water modeling for expansion of the Smokey
Canyon mine still predicts selenium contaminated "plumes," exceeding
Maximum Contaminant Levels (MCLs) to extend off site "at the end of a
100 year period."[^13] The inclusion of these sector J facilities to
fall under the same selenium criteria established for sector G is needed
and warranted.

2\. For benchmark monitoring to be effective, it needs to continue
through the life of the permit, as currently exists. The proposed waiver
for facilities to become exempt from benchmark monitoring if they do not
exceed established parameters in four quarters (section 3.2.2) may allow
testing and monitoring to cease before impacts of contamination manifest
themselves. As one example, the Smokey Canyon Mine (a phosphate mine in
Idaho) Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) of 1982 outlines an
annual water quality testing procedure, one of the test criteria being
selenium, predicated by previous leachate analysis of surface mine waste
in 1980 that would exceed EPA water quality standards. The water quality
monitoring program, testing ten locations on five local creeks, was
designed to alert the agencies involved of any developing water quality
problems of this mine.[^14] In 1993, sampling data began to show an
increase in selenium at one of the sampling sites, Pole Creek, measuring
.17mg/L, which was remarkably higher than that same stream's control
sample of .001 mg/L taken upstream of the mine. This same year also
noted decreases in macroinvertebrate populations.[^15] Annual reports
from 1994 on continued to show an increasing selenium problem spreading
to other streams tested under the monitoring program. Despite the data,
no action was taken except to initiate a CERCLA investigation in 2000
after the extent of the selenium contamination had reached the public
through the media. Smokey Canyon's Pole Canyon dump-site was filled
between 1985-1990. This fill in Pole Canyon is the source of the
elevated Se in test results first noted in the 1994 report on Pole
Creek. It is also the source of Se water samples taken in 1999 which had
levels that averaged 2,350µg/L Se. Selenium continues to leach from this
site at rates that have yet to stabilize.[^16] Important to this
discussion is the time between the completion of the fill site and the
time the selenium contamination was first noticed on Pole Creek of
0.17µg/L, which was three years and had grown to exhibit samples
measuring 2,350 µg/L in 1999 out of that same stream.[^17] Here is an
illustration of how an initial four quarters of benchmark monitoring
would not have shown any elevated selenium levels. Moreover had selenium
benchmark monitoring applied to phosphate mining, the contamination
noticed in 1993's tests would likely have been reported and acted upon.
These facilities may have enacted mitigation measures, modified BMP's
mandated by the Storm Water Pollution Prevention Plan under the permit,
rather than allowing the problems to escalate into the CERCLA site, as
now exists at Smokey Canyon Mine. The above example is only one of eight
dump sites at this mine and of many more that exist in southeast Idaho.
The old axiom "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" holds
true.

3\. Since a great portion of releases from waste rock piles occur from
storm water drainage, it is important to include as much as possible
what is considered storm water. It is noticed in J.3.2 that contaminated
seeps or adit drainage not related to storm water events are not covered
under the multi-sector permit. This is confusing because many waste rock
piles in Idaho occur at higher elevations where much of the
precipitation is snowfall. Therefore in the spring there may be drainage
and runoff from these piles related to the snowfall well into the
summer. The region 10's office of compliance and enforcement were at a
loss to give an answer to this dilemma other than to say that it is one
of the problems they deal with in the field.[^18] The GYC feels there
should be a more definitive delineation, because due to variations in
precipitation from year to year, there may be drainage due to "storm
events" that are exempted under the adit or seep provision.

The problems associated with selenium contamination in southeast Idaho
and the Salt River drainage in western Wyoming have grown at an enormous
rate in the past decade and are still growing. The GYC is hopeful the
EPA will give these comments serious consideration resulting in the
application of sector G monitoring requirements to sector J's 1475
facilities. We further wish the EPA to maintain the current benchmark
monitoring through the life of the permit. Finally, it is desired that
the EPA give clarification between what are seeps and adit drainage and
what is drainage from a storm event.

Respectfully submitted,

Richard Malloy

Greater Yellowstone Coalition

162 North Woodruff

Idaho Falls, ID 83401

Ph (208)522-7927

[^1]: McKelvey, V.E., Strobell, J.D., and Slaughter, A.L. 1986. The
    Vanadiferous Zone of the Phosphoria Formation in western Wyoming and
    southeastern Idaho. US Geol. Surv., Prof. Paper, 1465.

[^2]: Desborough, G., E. De Witt, J. Jones, A. Meier, and G. Meeker.
    1999. Preliminary Mineralogical and Chemical Studies Related to the
    Potential Mobility of Selenium and Associated Elements in Phosphoria
    Formation Strata, Southeastern Idaho. USGS Open File Report 99-120

[^3]: Smokey Canyon Mine, Panels B & C Final Supplemental Environmental
    Impact Statement. April, 2002.

[^4]: Weber, Frank. Research Triangle Institute, Research Triangle Park,
    NC. Technical Report. RTI Project No.:08973.002.009, May 19, 2005.,
    September 19, 2005.

[^5]: Idaho State Journal. 12 Nov.,1999. Pocatello, Idaho.

    Idaho State Journal, 6 Jun., 2001. Pocatello, Idaho.

    Caribou County Sun, 19 Jun., 2003. Soda Springs, Idaho

[^6]: Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, 2002. Health Consultation,
    Selenium in Fish Streams of the Upper Blackfoot River Watershed.

[^7]: U.S. Department of the Interior. 1998. Guidelines for
    interpretation of the biological effects of selected constituents in
    biota, water, and sediment. National Irrigation Water Quality
    Program Information Report No. 3, U.S. Department of Interior,
    Washington, D.C. Levels of concern are defined as follows:
    "...rarely produce discernable adverse effects but are elevated
    above typical background concentrations" whereas concentrations
    above these levels "...appear to produce adverse effects on some
    fish and wildlife."

[^8]: Weber, Frank. Research Triangle Institute, Research Triangle Park,
    NC. Technical Report. RTI Project No.:08973.002.009, Sep. 19, 2005.

[^9]: Joe Skorupa, USFWS, in e-mail to Sheryl Hill, 9 June 2003.

[^10]: North Rasmussen Ridge Mine Final Environmental Impact Statement.
    Pg 44. August 2003.

[^11]: North Rasmussen Ridge Draft Environmental Impact Statement. Pg
    2-30. March 2003.

[^12]: Maxim Technologies Inc. Bozeman, Montana. Simplot Smokey Canyon
    Mine Expansion Environmental Impact Statement Column Test Report:
    prepared for J.R. Simplot Company. 2002.

[^13]: Buck, Brian W., Winegar, Bruce. Integration of Surface Water
    Management with Mitigation of Ground Water Impacts at a Proposed
    Phosphate Mine Overburden Facility

    <http://www.jbr-env.com/about/articles/BuckandWinegarPaper4.pdf>

[^14]: Smokey Canyon Phosphate Mine Final Environmental Impact
    Statement. March 1982. pgs. 2-22, 2-23 J.R. Simplot Co., Caribou
    County, Idaho.

[^15]: Mariah Associates Inc. Laramie, Wyoming. Aquatic Monitoring
    Program for Smokey Canyon Mine. 1994 results. On file at Bureau of
    Land Management office. Pocatello, Idaho.

[^16]: Site Investigation Report. Newfields, July 2005, Chapter 11, pgs.
    11-15. J.R. Simplot Company.

[^17]: Hill, Sheryl. Aquatic Systems Biologist. Pocatello, Idaho. An
    Analysis of Selenium Concentrations in Water and Biological Tissue
    Samples Collected in the Upper Blackfoot River and Salt River
    Watersheds from 1997 to 2003., 2005.

[^18]: Phone Communication. 14 Dec. 2005. Eva Chun.