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Section 319
NONPOINT SOURCE PROGRAM SUCCESS STORY
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Re-Mining and Reclaiming Abandoned Mine Lands Improves Water
Quality in Black Creek
Waterbody Improved
Acidic drainage from disturbed lands and abandoned coal mines led
to the impairment of Black Creek in southwestern Virginia. In 1998
the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) added Black Creek to the state's Clean Water
Act (CWA) section 303(d) list of impaired waters for not supporting aquatic life use. A total maximum
daily load (TMDL) was developed in 2002, and watershed stakeholders implemented mined-land best
management practices to address exceedances in total manganese (TMn) and total dissolved solids
(TDS). Monitoring results show improvements in the biological health of Black Creek, indicating that
restoration efforts have made significant progress toward meeting water quality standards.
Problem
The Black Creek watershed (Figure 1) is in Wise
County, Virginia, just west of the town of Norton.
Black Creek flows into the Powell River, which is
part of the Upper Tennessee River Drainage Basin,
and eventually drains into the Mississippi River
and the Gulf of Mexico. Over the past century, coal
processing wastes generated at preparation plants
(facilities that wash soil and rock from the coal to
prepare it for transport) and coal-loading sites were
often disposed of in nearby hollows or creeks,
contributing sediment and dissolved minerals into
waterbodies like Black Creek.
Before the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation
Act of 1977 was in effect, miners commonly prac-
ticed "shoot-and-shove" mining in steeply sloped
areas—blasting the soil and strata overlying the
coal and pushing it downhill. That practice created
the characteristic highwall-bench-outslope terrain
that is still visible in Virginia's coalfield counties.
Such outslope spoils are generally unstable and
contain pollutants that can impair coalfield-area
streams like Black Creek.
Data collected in the mid-1990s indicate that Black
Creek did not support aquatic life, prompting DEQ
to add a 5.98-mile segment of the creek to Virginia's
CWA section 303(d) list in 1998. A 2002 TMDL study
determined that the specific chemical stressors
causing benthic impairment were TMn and TDS,
two stressors that originate from acid mine drainage
from abandoned underground mines and deep-mine
cavities. As a result, the load allocation for TMn in
the Black Creek TMDL was set at 1,599 kilograms/
year. A TMDL was not developed for TDS. The
water quality goal identified for Black Creek includes
Figure 1. Virginia's Black Creek watershed has been
mined for more than 100 years.
reclaiming abandoned sites and achieving pollution
load reduction in the impaired segment.
Project Highlights
Reclaiming abandoned mine lands is costly.
Virginia's mining regulatory agency, the Department
of Mines, Minerals, and Energy's Division of Mined
Land Reclamation (DMME-DMLR), considers re-
mining an appropriate approach to reclaiming aban-
doned mine lands. In re-mining, coal companies
obtain the appropriate permits and then re-disturb
lands that were previously mined, remove remaining
coal, eliminate existing environmental problems,
and reclaim the land to current standards.
In 1996 Virginia DMME-DMLR issued a mining
permit to the Red River Coal Company to begin
re-mining operations in Black Creek watershed. In
2002 DMME-DMLR approved the Red River Coal

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Company's re-mining and
reclamation pian, which
directly addresses TMn
and TDS, the two stressors
listed in the Black Creek
TMDL Red River Coal
Company has completed
75 percent of its re-mining
and reclamation plan,
restoring approximately
300 acres of abandoned
mine lands. As outlined in
the plan, Red River Coai
Company is implement-
ing the following mined-land best management
practices:
Figure 2. Red River Coal Company
revegetated and regraded mined
areas to reduce erosion and restore
original contours on mined areas.
1.	Revegetating mined areas to control water
infiltration and erosion
2.	Regrading to restore original contours on mined
areas (Figure 2):
3.	Constructing wetlands
4.	Installing sediment ponds to collect drainage
from disturbed areas and provide stormwater
retention and sedimentation
5.	Restoring riparian areas along stream segments
6.	Constructing diversion ditches to restore
drainage patterns and direct water away from
outslopes and areas where erosion and mineral-
leaching potentials are high
7 Installing infiltration channels (shallow, exca-
vated trenches backfilled with coarse gravel and
covered with soil and grass) to slow stormwater
runoff
8. Daylighting with resource recovery, in which
deep-mined coal seams are exposed by sur-
face mining so thatthe remaining coal can be
recovered, thus eliminating existing pollutant
discharge
In addition, DMME-DMLR secured grant funding to
install additional restoration projects in Black Creek,
including a wetland area enhancement project (2001)
and five habitat improvement structures (2006).
Results
Chemical water monitoring, performed routinely
by the Red River Coal Company, shows marked
improvement in water quality of Black Creek.
DMME-DMLR also collects biological assessment
data, which show increases in the taxa richness
(total number of different kinds of organisms), EFT
richness (total number of taxa within the "pollution
sensitive" orders Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera, and
Trichoptera), the percent Ephemeroptera, and per-
cent "Scrapers" (Plecoptera and Trichoptera). Among
those metrics, higher values indicate an increase in
water quality. Additionally, both the Virginia Stream
Condition Index (VSCI) and habitat score of Black
Creek increased between 2001 and 2009, indicating
an increase in water quality (Table 1).
Table 1. Virginia Stream Condition Index (VSCI)
metrics for aquatic health in Black Creek

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While most aquatic life metrics indicate water
quality improvements, some issues remain. For
example, Table 1 shows fluctuations in the percent
Chironomidae index—it dropped from 81.6 in 1995
to zero in 2001, but crept back up to 12.84 in 2009.
This index represents the presence of pollutant-
tolerant organisms; therefore, index values tend
to increase as water quality get worse. After the
Black Creek re-mining and reclamation plan is fully
implemented, DMME-DMLR and DEQ will reassess
the impairment status of the stream to determine
if Black Creek can be removed from Virginia's CWA
section 303(d) list.
Partners and Funding
Red River Coal Company is the Virginia-based
coal company that is re-mining the Black Creek
watershed. Virginia DMME-DMLR contributed to
the development of the Black Creek TMDL and
oversees biological monitoring within the water-
shed. DEQ has also been involved in assessing the
impairment status of Black Creek. Supplemental
DMME-DMLR projects in the watershed were sup-
ported by grants from the National Fish and Wildlife
Foundation (for the habitat improvement structures)
and by EPA CWA section 319 and the U.S. Office
of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement
Clean Streams Initiative (for the wetland enhance-
ment project).
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U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Office of Water
Washington, DC
EPA 841-F-12-001G
April 2012
For additional! information contact:
George Joey O'Quinn
Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals, and Energy
276-523-8201 • joey.oquinn@dmme.virginia.gov

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