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Dolores River Coalition September 9, 2011 Ms. Laura Kilpatrick, Esq. DOE ULP Program Manager Uranium Leasing Program Programmatic EIS Office of Legacy Management U.S. Department of Energy 11025 Dover Street, Suite 1000 Westminster, CO 80021 Re: Scoping comments on Uranium Leasing Program Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement Delivered via email: [email protected] Dear Ms. Kilpatrick: We are writing you as members of the Dolores River Coalition, a partnership of eighteen local, regional, state, and national groups working for improved management and protection of the Dolores River Corridor and watershed, from McPhee Reservoir near Dolores, Colorado to its confluence with the Colorado River at Dewey Bridge in Utah. Because of our ongoing partnership and collaborative work to support the river corridor, the watershed, and the communities in the basin, we are greatly concerned about the impacts from mining, milling, and transportation of uranium ore on the Southwest corner of Colorado and the Southwestern United States. Thank you for your decision to develop a full Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS) for the Uranium Leasing Program (ULP), which will offer a vehicle to ensure that the environmental consequences, alternatives, and mitigation measures will be thoroughly evaluated under the National Environmental Policy Act. Included in this letter are the collective areas of general concern that our coalition request be addressed based on our ongoing work in the Dolores River watershed. Individual organizations within our coalition will also be submitting scoping comments that focus on their specific concerns. Our Coalition is united in the principle recognition that the Dolores River Basin is a unique local and national resource that provides significant ecological systems that benefit the natural environment, and support human habitation throughout the Dolores River basin and beyond. The tributaries and side canyons of the Dolores River contribute to these natural systems and to the basin’s national and regional significance that have been identified in public land planning processes and collaborative efforts for many years. It is essential that the Department of Energy (DOE) acknowledges the values that citizens have worked hard to recognize, support, and safeguard, and that the leasing program is compatible with citizen and agency efforts to protect these values. Cooperating agencies and collaborative processes The Dolores River Coalition and affiliates have been directly involved with various land management processes and collaborations in the Dolores River watershed including the Dolores River Dialogue, the Lower Dolores River Plan Working Group, the Gateway Stakeholder Roundtable, and recent resource management plans including the San Juan 1 Public Lands SEIS, a proposed Gothic Shale Master Leasing Plan, and the Bureau of Land Management’s Grand Junction and Uncompahgre Field Offices’ Resource Management Plan Revisions. These plans will provide the overall direction for public land management in the proposed leasing area for the next 20 years. DOE's leasing program interplays directly with these and other processes in geographic scope, and in related management decisions. Additionally, the DOE ULP could also affect findings of Wild and Scenic River suitability on the San Miguel and Dolores Rivers, and their tributaries. As such, cooperation with other agencies needs to be explicitly addressed, and management conflicts must be proactively mitigated. The DOE's analysis must include collaboration with these field offices and the other federal, state, and local cooperating agencies. The Dolores River Dialogue is a collaborative community discussion that has been focused on the Dolores River below McPhee Reservoir since 2004. The purpose statement of the DRD is as follows: The Dolores River Dialogue (DRD) is a coalition of diverse interests, whose purpose is to explore management opportunities, build support for and take action to improve the ecological conditions downstream of McPhee Reservoir while honoring water rights, protecting agricultural and municipal water supplies, and the continued enjoyment of rafting and fishing. The Lower Dolores River Plan Working Group (the Working Group) is a diverse stakeholder group which was formed by the DRD to provide feedback to the BLM San Juan Field Office for the agency’s corridor management plan below McPhee Reservoir, as well as to discuss wild and scenic suitability or appropriate alternatives. The Dolores River Coalition has participated in the DRD and the Working Group, which both include conservation, agriculture, water management, land management, recreational and governmental interests, among others. These collaborative stakeholder efforts have been extensive, and should not be diminished by the Uranium Leasing Program. Most recently the Working Group has been focused on ensuring that native fish are sustained in the Dolores below McPhee Reservoir where native fish populations are in sharp decline. More information on the status of native fish in the Lower Dolores and opportunities for improvement is available in the final report from the recent scientific inquiry called A Way Forward (http://ocs.fortlewis.edu/drd/way-forward.htm). The scientific analysis of native fish from A Way Forward should be considered in the DOE’s management decisions to ensure that management scenarios for native fish are not in conflict. Potential impacts to native fish, aquatic species, riparian habitat, and recreational values must be thoroughly addressed by the DOE. Further, the DOE must assess the impacts of uranium leasing on the river corridor and specifically detail how impacts to native fish and other sensitive species will be avoided. The Gateway Stakeholder Roundtable was a collaborative process initiated on behalf of the Mesa County Commissioners to assess the values and discuss future land management options in the Gateway and Northern Dolores area. The process identified a need for more discussions on how to protect the spectacular landscape that includes two Wilderness Study areas and seven Citizen Proposed Wilderness areas. Much of the natural landscape was identified as a shared-value for community members and diverse interest groups alike. The recreational values and scenic attributes of the greater Gateway area need to be protected, and any resource development must be thoughtfully assessed. Collectively, we must determine the extent to which uranium development is, or is not, compatible with the increase in recreation, and the scenic values that serve it, along the river and in the 2 surrounding landscapes throughout the Dolores River Basin. A socioeconomic analysis must be conducted to assess impacts of land use on the surrounding communities. Other factors will play a vital role in the final decision, such as impacts to the ecological systems that sustain the communities. The Dolores River Restoration Project is another collaborative effort that has been working diligently on developing and implementing a restoration plan throughout the Dolores River Watershed. Many agencies and organizations have been involved, and should be consulted to ensure that the Uranium Leasing Program is not in conflict with restoration efforts. Threats to Wilderness Quality Lands The Dolores River basin, from McPhee Reservoir to the confluence with the Colorado River, includes three Wilderness Study Areas (WSAs) and ten Citizen Wilderness Proposals (CWPs). These areas are under consideration for legislative protections, and thus disturbances to these areas must be avoided, and they should be excluded from the leasing tracts. In addition, Wilderness Study Areas are subject to specific protections pursuant to the BLM’s Interim Management Policy for Lands Under Wilderness Review. The alternatives need to encompass options that would withhold all these WSAs and CWPs from leasing and mining for a period of at least ten years, to permit completion of decisions to designate or specially manage such areas through legislation or pending administrative decisions. These areas host rare values associated with their remote or relatively undisturbed condition, including high densities of rare and imperiled species, dense concentration of critical wildlife habitat, prized hunting and angling opportunities, spectacular scenic resources, and rapidly vanishing opportunities for primitive recreation. This concentration of sensitive and rare natural resources, and the corollary alternative land uses based on sustainable utilization of these resources, must be carefully weighed in analysis of physical and economic impacts. Impacts to plant and animal species and communities Due to the lack of general or site specific data regarding impacts of past mining activities on plants, wildlife, and ecosystems, the DOE must thoroughly analyze the indirect, direct and cumulative impacts of the proposed leasing on threatened, endangered and sensitive species, and other rare and imperiled species and natural communities. Any designated Critical Habitat Areas should be excluded from the leasing tracts, and the PEIS must include an analysis of potential impacts to species that are not present on the lease tracts, but that inhabit the full project area, including the Dolores River and its tributaries, and a portion of the Colorado River downstream from the lease tracts. The DOE should use a combination of Colorado Division of Parks and Wildlife and Colorado Natural Heritage Program GIS data to determine species likely to be present in the
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