The Department of Environmental Protection has awarded $7,983,107 for remediation projects at and near abandoned mine sites in Clearfield, Luzerne, Schuylkill and Somerset counties.

“These projects will make one neighborhood safer from mine subsidence, provide water to another, and reclaim hundreds of acres of land that was mined and abandoned decades ago,” DEP Deputy Secretary for Active and Abandoned Mine Operations John Stefanko said.

Eighty homes in rural Clearfield County will have a safe and reliable water supply when they are connected to an extension of a municipal waterline. Their private water wells were contaminated by mine sites abandoned in the mid-1970s.

Also in Clearfield County, abandoned mine tunnels beneath 111 homes in Houtzdale Borough will be stabilized to significantly reduce the risk of collapse, which could cause the ground to subside and possibly damage homes and create safety hazards.

Remediation work at sites in Luzerne, Schuylkill and Somerset counties will restore vegetation to a total of 233 acres after contractors re-grade more than 2.6 million cubic yards to eliminate dangerously steep highwalls and fill in surface mining pits. Work at the sites will also include excavating more than 31,000 cubic yards and installing more than 23,000 square yards of rock lining to control water runoff.

The water main extension project in Clearfield County is being funded by Growing Greener II, which was funded by a voter-approved bond issue.

All other contracts were awarded on a competitive basis and are being funded by a grant from the federal Office of Surface Mining. The federal fund is supported by a tax on the modern coal industry and is distributed to states as annual grants to reclaim mine sites that were abandoned prior to passage of the federal Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977.

A list of projects funded is available online.

6/4/2012