“The work done to reach this point was largely completed by UCM employees that will never receive proper recognition for their efforts. All of the 367 acres approved for Phase III release were reclaimed long before I accepted this job in 2013. I’m just the guy that sent the letter to tell DNR that our work has been completed.” — Rich Sivils, Reclamation Engineer at Usibelli Coal Mine
invaluable as the model for the Poker bond release procedure and process. A bond release package was sub- mitted in 2020 that contained the necessary vegetation cover and di- versity reports for the two year study conducted in 2018-2019. This bond release request was for the entire 430 acres previously ap- proved in 2016 for Phase II release. DNR conducted a joint inspection with the Office of Surface Mining (OSM) in June 2021. This consisted of walking the en- tire 430 acres, photographing the site,
collecting drone data for the entire area which was interpreted to show infor- mation on vegetation cover and density and noting any deficiencies that would require additional work before final bond release could be granted. UCM is pleased that out of the 430 acres submitted for consideration, 367 acres were approved by DNR for final bond release after decades of work has been put into reaching this milestone. Since the vegetation study greenlighted the entire 430 acres for Phase III re- lease, UCM will complete several small
projects and resubmit the remaining areas for the remaining 63 acres in the coming months, with the hopes of Phase III release on these areas in 2022. In terms of the outstanding bond amount for Poker Flats, UCM has sig- nificantly reduced its bond liability. The bond for Poker Flats has been re- duced from $2.5 million to the current amount of roughly $400,000. This is only made possible by the relentless work that UCM has successfully com- pleted, which can be seen today in the beautifully restored landscape.
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Fall 2021
The Alaska Miner
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