ASSESSMENT OF THE APPLICABILITY OF AN ANOXIC LIMESTONE DRAIN FOR A SURFACE MINE IN EAST CENTRAL TENNESSEE

Abstract

Anoxic limestone drains (ALDs) are a cost-effective technique for adding alkalinity to acid mine drainage. However, the applicability of an ALD is limited to a rather narrow range of mine drainage chemical conditions due to concerns about the armoring of limestone with ferric hydroxide, the plugging of flow paths with aluminum hydroxide, and the limited solubility of calcite. While the armoring and plugging potentials can be assessed with careful water quality analyses, the solubility of limestone in a particular mine water cannot, at this time, be predicted from mine water chemistry. Thus, the danger always exists that the ALD will generate insufficient alkalinity to completely neutralize the acidic water, resulting in either insufficiently treated discharge or a need for additional treatment. In order to remove uncertainty from the design of a 4,000-ton ALD, we conducted limestone incubation tests and pilot-scale ALD tests. Incubation tests were done using a modified version of the {open_quotes}cubitainer{close_quotes} procedure developed by the United States Bureau of Mines. The pilot ALD consisted of 65 tons of limestone. Hydrologic loading experiments were conducted that provided an assessment of the ALD performance under design flow conditions and flow rates four times higher than the design flow. Under design more » flow conditions, the pilot ALD discharged water with alkalinity concentrations similar to that predicted by the cubitainer tests (360 parts per million). With increased flow, concentrations of alkalinity in the pilot ALD effluent decreased, with the water becoming net acidic at a flow rate of 15 gallons per minute. The results of the pilot ALD were used to size a full-scale ALD and model ALD performance under a variety of flow conditions. « less