Cleaning Up Abandoned Hardrock Mines
Purpose of the Report
Of all the ways in which the Western past remains tightly connected to the Western present and future, acid mine drainage may be the most telling example. The mining booms of the nineteenth century and the early twentieth century left behind a legacy of trouble for today's Westerners. The necessity of reckoning with this legacy is now much on the minds of mining industry leaders, environmental activists, government agencies, and concerned citizens of communities in mining territory.
With the goal of bringing these groups together to reinforce and create positive solutions to this problem, The Center of the American West held a three–day workshop on October 21–23, 2004, in Boulder, Colorado. The workshop was attended by about thirty to forty participants invited for their expertise and experience in remediation of abandoned mines. The participants examined successful and stymied efforts to remediate abandoned hard rock mines that generate acid mine drainage in the western United States. The workshop emphasized the need for a confluence of efforts by community residents, legislators, engineers, historians, creative writers, and artists to find solutions to the problem of acid mine drainage and abandoned mine remediation.
The major product of the workshop was the Cleaning Up Abandoned Hard Rock Mines in the West Report on these solutions. The Report follows the model of the Center of the American West's publication of reports on energy (What Every Westerner Should Know About Energy), science (Making the Most of Science in the American West), and economics and development (Boom and Bust in the American West). The workshop organizers wrote the position paper reflecting the consensus opinion of the workshop participants. The report format permits the use of sidebars to express important dissenting opinions worth everyone's consideration.