Sen. Heinrich pushes to make mine cleanup easier. Bill passes out of committee with bipartisan support

From shallow pits and deep shafts to piles of waste, the state Abandoned Mine Land Program estimates more than 15,000 abandoned sites of this kind exist in New Mexico. But legislation making its way through Congress could make it easier for those one-time excavation areas to get cleaned up.

“There’s never been a thorough assessment to determine where all of these sites are and which ones are causing harm to the environment,” said Dan Roper, New Mexico state lead for Trout Unlimited.

Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., is sponsoring a “Good Samaritan” bill, which would reduce the liability for groups that want to clean up an abandoned mine but don’t own it, such as nonprofits or municipalities. The bill would pilot a new permitting process for cleaning up certain types of abandoned hard-rock mine sites and allow entities to clean the site up without being liable for remediating all of the pollution at the site.

“This only applies to abandoned sites where no one is on the hook for the contamination or the pollution,” Roper said. “So, these are often old legacy mines. Mining occurred maybe 100 years ago. ... No one’s liable. No one’s financially on the hook for these places, which is why we need entities to step up and clean up these places to improve the water quality, to improve the fish and wildlife habitat, to reduce potential exposure that could harm human health.”

The pilot program focuses on lower-risk sites. Bigger contaminated sites that pose a more substantial risk to human health would need to be cleaned up under existing programs.

Trout Unlimited is a nonprofit in support of the legislation. The group focuses on conserving wild and native trout populations and works on restoring watersheds and rivers. The bulk of its work in New Mexico is restoring waterways that have been impacted by wildfire, Roper said.

Trout Unlimited is working on projects in the Gila Wilderness to restore stream habitat for the endangered Gila trout. In northern New Mexico, the nonprofit is doing habitat restoration for the Rio Grande cutthroat trout. It is also working with grazing permit holders in the Jemez Mountains to reduce the impact on streams from grazing.

Trout Unlimited also cleans up abandoned mine land sites in Colorado and Montana and is considering some mine sites in New Mexico.

Contaminated mine sites fall into two main categories: point and non-point sources of contamination, according to Jason Willis, Trout Unlimited’s Western Abandoned Mine Land program director.

Point sources are like a draining mine. Non-point sources are broader sources of contamination, such as mine waste piles that can’t be pinned to one source.

A point source of contamination has to be treated under the Clean Water Act standards. If those standards aren’t met, the group cleaning up the site could be liable for the remaining pollution. The new legislation would allow groups to design a specific level of removal instead of having to hit the table value standards, Willis said.

“There are ways to make a measurable change by not achieving those standards, and that’s what this bill would help do on some of these point sources,” said Willis, who believes the bill would open up more sites to be treated.

The bill was introduced in September and passed out of the Committee on Environment and Public Works last week. So far, the bill has garnered bipartisan support with 27 cosponsors. Heinrich and Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, previously introduced the legislation in 2022.

“We have Good Samaritans ready to clean up abandoned mines that are threatening our communities through the land, water, fish, and wildlife they rely on,” Heinrich said in a statement. “I’m proud to reintroduce this bipartisan legislation with Senator Risch to create a path for Good Samaritan groups to clean up these sites in New Mexico and across the country.”