1 / 18

Set Aside Treatability Guidelines

Set Aside Treatability Guidelines. Brent Means U.S. Office of Surface Mining. Introduction. The SA program is ~ 14 years old. The AML reauthorization provides an opportunity and reason to perform a review of the SA program.

nikkos
Download Presentation

Set Aside Treatability Guidelines

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. Set Aside Treatability Guidelines Brent Means U.S. Office of Surface Mining

  2. Introduction • The SA program is ~ 14 years old • The AML reauthorization provides an opportunity and reason to perform a review of the SA program • The workgroup was formed to produce guidelines that would form the basis for future project selection • The guidelines contain both project selection and treatability criteria

  3. Project Selection and Treatability Document: Guiding Principals Achieving and maintaining restoration is most important SA program should be expanded to consider any type of treatment (not just passive) Restoration should be done in a “comprehensive” manner

  4. Treatability Criteria • The goal of the criteria is to ensure the proposed treatment or abatement strategy is an appropriate match for the water quality and site conditions • The treatability scoring is based on three evaluations: • A “Proven” evaluation: focused on evaluating whether the proposed scenario is proven to provide treatment • A “Reliability” evaluation: an operational evaluation • A “Predictable” evaluation: a maintenance evaluation • The proposed treatment project is evaluated against the criteria for each of the three assessments, resulting in an overall score for the Treatability section of the document

  5. Proven Evaluation A “proven” technology is a treatment or abatement technique that: • is successfully used at numerous locations under treatment scenarios similar to the proposed project; • is sized or manufactured using a science-base approach that can be evaluated • has a data-supported performance record

  6. Reliable Evaluation A “reliable” treatment or abatement technology is one that: • Can achieve the treatment/abatement goals > 90% of the design life; • Can be operated and maintained to consistently achieve treatment/abatement goals; • Can be manipulated to achieve treatment/abatement goals under varying flow, chemistry, and operational conditions;

  7. Predictable Evaluation A “predictable” treatment or abatement technology is one that: • contains troubleshooting capacity; • can be maintained or rehabilitated if the treatment/abatement goals are not being achieved; • has maintenance flexibility built into the treatment scheme;

  8. Set Aside projects are arranged into 6 Categories • Active Treatment • Passive Treatment of Net Alkaline discharges • Passive Treatment of Net Acidic discharges using ALD • All other types of Passive Treatment for Net Acidic water • Innovative Technology • Abatement projects • All SA projects fit into one of these categories and evaluated against the “Proven”, “Reliable,” and ‘Predictable” scoring criteria

  9. Example using Active Treatment Proven Evaluation: • is successfully used at numerous locations under treatment scenarios similar to the proposed project; • is sized or manufactured using a science-base approach that can be evaluated • has a data-supported performance record ** Can automatically receive a high proven score if it is commonly used to achieve water quality based standards in similar situations • Other factors that affect the “Proven” evaluation

  10. Example using Active Treatment • Other factors that affect “Reliability” evaluation: • Ability to achieve treatment goals under the range in hydrologic and geochemical conditions characterized at the site • Ability to continue treatment during desludging • Ease of operation Reliable Evaluation (deals with operational issues) : • Evaluate the likelihood that the recommended system can achieve the treatment/abatement goals > 90% of the design life; • Evaluate whether the proposed system can be operated and maintained to consistently achieve treatment/abatement goals; • Evaluate whether the proposed system can be manipulated to achieve treatment/abatement goals under varying flow, chemistry, and operational conditions • Evaluate whether the proposed system be operated to achieve varying degrees of treatment

  11. Example using Active Treatment Predictability Evaluation (deals with maintenance issues) : • Evaluate the whether the proposed system contains the capacity to easily troubleshoot operational problems; • Evaluate whether the proposed system can be easily maintained or rehabilitated if the treatment/abatement goals are not being achieved; • Evaluate whether the proposed system contains maintenance flexibility built into the treatment scheme; • Other factors that affect the “Predictability” evaluation • Time frame between chemical replenishment • Time frame between desludging events • Sludge handling • Longevity of sludge storage volume

  12. Treatability Evaluation • Active Treatment - covered • Passive Treatment of Net Alkaline Discharges • Promoted by automatically receiving a high “proven” score • Scoring is affected by sludge handling, sludge storage volume, addresses the effects of temp., etc. • Passive Treatment of Net Acidic Discharges using ALDs • Promoted by automatically receiving a high “proven” score • Ease of troubleshooting system, sludge handling, rehabilitation plan • All other types of passive treatment for Net Acidic discharges using passive Treatment

  13. Treatability Evaluation • All other types of passive treatment for Net Acidic discharges using passive Treatment Proven Evaluation: • Discharge characteristics are compared against risk matrix to obtain a score • Risk Matrix was developed on the premise that passive treatment (e.g. VFP) best performs (longevity, maintenance) on low-loading discharges • The intent of the risk matrix is to provide a structured approach for project selection that would be continuously refined as projects are completed and performance is field-validated

  14. All other Passive Treatment on Net Acidic water • Other factors that affect “Reliability” evaluation: • Ability to control flow into the system • Ease of treatment operation • Ability to continue treatment during desludging or rehabilitation events Reliability Evaluation: • Evaluate the likelihood that the recommended system can achieve the treatment/abatement goals > 90% of the design life; • Evaluate whether the proposed system can be operated and maintained to consistently achieve treatment/abatement goals; • Evaluate whether the proposed system can be manipulated to achieve treatment/abatement goals under varying flow, chemistry, and operational conditions • Evaluate whether the proposed system be operated to achieve varying degrees of treatment

  15. All other Passive Treatment on Net Acidic Water • Other factors that affect the “Predictability” evaluation • Ability to monitor the progression of plugging • Ease of troubleshooting treatment system • Time frame between rehabilitation events • A plan to dispose of compost or limestone Predictability Evaluation (deals with maintenance issues) : • Evaluate the whether the proposed system contains the capacity to easily troubleshoot operational problems; • Evaluate whether the proposed system can be easily maintained or rehabilitated if the treatment/abatement goals are not being achieved; • Evaluate whether the proposed system contains maintenance flexibility built into the treatment scheme;

  16. Treatability Evaluation • Innovative Technology • AML money is not permitted for “research” activities • Innovative Technologies would be subject to a “proven, reliability (operation), and predictability (Maintenance)” evaluations • Abatement Projects • Abatement Projects would be subject to a “proven, reliability (operation), and predictability (Maintenance)” evaluations • The background data should be sufficient enough to show the cause/effect relationship between the mining feature and the affected water resource

  17. THE END

More Related