City of Emily: Sitting on a Manganese Mine
by Sheila Helmberger
The population of the city of Emily, Minnesota is just over 900 residents. Like many other small communities in the state Emily has a bank, a couple of restaurants, gas stations and everything you would expect in a resort and vacation community. It also has something none of the others do. Emily is home to one of the largest known high-grade deposits of manganese in North America. It sits on five-acres just north of the city off country road 6.
The manganese was discovered in the 1940's. A plan was prepared to mine it in 1995 but met strong resistance from local residents. In recent years companies from the Ukraine, India, China and Australia have all approached the land owner for rights to mine the mineral located there.
Crow Wing Power, a local electrical cooperative, stepped in recently to purchase the 12 acre site. The company has proved that it shares the community's interest of preserving the land and recreational area surrounding the manganese. They promised to proceed with caution. Because of this, conversations took a more serious turn, and the community looks like it might be ready for such a step.
George Pepek is the mayor of Emily. "I think people appreciate that the local electrical cooperative that has been here for 70 years and will be here for a long time is working on the project and they're approaching this in the right way."
"We started looking at it a couple years ago," said Char Kinzer, Public Relations spokesperson for Crow Wing Power. "We are very excited because recently we've learned manganese has the potential to be a very good emission cleaner which we have an interest in, too."
Crow Wing Power relies on coal-fired power plants for its power. Historically manganese has been used in steel and aluminum production and in batteries. Most of the country's current supply comes from Africa so the 1 billion pound site in Emily is news on a very large scale.
A new, environmentally friendly method for extracting the manganese is another step in making its removal a realistic possibility. The procedure is called borehole extraction. "The extraction process is new to the United States - at least in trying to dig out manganese," said Kinzer, "The process has been used in Europe and foreign countries," she said explaining it more in-depth. "A well casing of about 10" wide and down 200-400 feet would be used where the ground water is located then the process uses high pressure jets that circle around and mixes the manganese with the water. It will break the manganese apart and draw it up the well casing to be dumped into a large container and the groundwater is removed and recycled. It should be a relatively quiet operation," she said.
If possible and all of the necessary hurdles are jumped including securing the necessary permits Crow Wing Power hopes to perform a test run this fall to make sure the procedure will work for the site in Emily and that it is as safe and noninvasive to the land as it's promised to be.
"They hope to try a real short draw just to see how much you get in an x amount of time and use the test to monitor surrounding wells at the same time. "We need to make sure it will not harm or reduce the ground water," said Kinzer, "It has to be environmentally safe for the land and we need to make sure it's the right process to use. We'll learn a lot just by taking a little bit out," said Kinzer. Results will be looked at by the EPA, Department of Health, and the MPCA as well as others. All of those results would be reviewed before a full commercial process would ever start."
There are a lot of people involved," said Mayor Pepek, "There are residents and government entities. We're not really sure what to expect. All we know is we haven't been through this before. There will be some public forums yet. Crow Wing Power has given us their time line - we're forming an environmental review committee that will consist of some local people. It's still all in the infant stages," said Pepek. "We're into really strong communication on this. I feel kind of like people should know what's going on. We will just follow our instincts and listen to what the government agencies tell us," said
Pepek, "There are two lakes within two miles of the project and both are spring fed, Ruth Lake and Anna Lake. The project is right between the two. We just really have to be careful."
A green light on the project could mean much needed jobs to the city in today's gloomy economy and a financial boom to the little vacationland city.
"It's very exciting especially in these down economic times something big and hopeful that could benefit all of the area financially," said Kinzer of the possible $20-25 million in tax revenue the project could mean to Emily and area school districts as well as county, state and federal governments and profits to return to its own cooperative members.
"Emily is the City of Lakes," said Mayor Pepek. "It's a beautiful city with a lot of lakes. It's what makes people want to come here so you don't want to destroy that. It could be a big help to the city but we want to put a lot of thought into it."
If everything checks out after the initial testing and the process proves safe for the community of Emily, its residents and its surrounding environment mining could start in earnest in a year, maybe two. The operation is expected to take about five years.
The population of the city of Emily, Minnesota is just over 900 residents. Like many other small communities in the state Emily has a bank, a couple of restaurants, gas stations and everything you would expect in a resort and vacation community. It also has something none of the others do. Emily is home to one of the largest known high-grade deposits of manganese in North America. It sits on five-acres just north of the city off country road 6.
The manganese was discovered in the 1940's. A plan was prepared to mine it in 1995 but met strong resistance from local residents. In recent years companies from the Ukraine, India, China and Australia have all approached the land owner for rights to mine the mineral located there.
Crow Wing Power, a local electrical cooperative, stepped in recently to purchase the 12 acre site. The company has proved that it shares the community's interest of preserving the land and recreational area surrounding the manganese. They promised to proceed with caution. Because of this, conversations took a more serious turn, and the community looks like it might be ready for such a step.
George Pepek is the mayor of Emily. "I think people appreciate that the local electrical cooperative that has been here for 70 years and will be here for a long time is working on the project and they're approaching this in the right way."
"We started looking at it a couple years ago," said Char Kinzer, Public Relations spokesperson for Crow Wing Power. "We are very excited because recently we've learned manganese has the potential to be a very good emission cleaner which we have an interest in, too."
Crow Wing Power relies on coal-fired power plants for its power. Historically manganese has been used in steel and aluminum production and in batteries. Most of the country's current supply comes from Africa so the 1 billion pound site in Emily is news on a very large scale.
A new, environmentally friendly method for extracting the manganese is another step in making its removal a realistic possibility. The procedure is called borehole extraction. "The extraction process is new to the United States - at least in trying to dig out manganese," said Kinzer, "The process has been used in Europe and foreign countries," she said explaining it more in-depth. "A well casing of about 10" wide and down 200-400 feet would be used where the ground water is located then the process uses high pressure jets that circle around and mixes the manganese with the water. It will break the manganese apart and draw it up the well casing to be dumped into a large container and the groundwater is removed and recycled. It should be a relatively quiet operation," she said.If possible and all of the necessary hurdles are jumped including securing the necessary permits Crow Wing Power hopes to perform a test run this fall to make sure the procedure will work for the site in Emily and that it is as safe and noninvasive to the land as it's promised to be.
"They hope to try a real short draw just to see how much you get in an x amount of time and use the test to monitor surrounding wells at the same time. "We need to make sure it will not harm or reduce the ground water," said Kinzer, "It has to be environmentally safe for the land and we need to make sure it's the right process to use. We'll learn a lot just by taking a little bit out," said Kinzer. Results will be looked at by the EPA, Department of Health, and the MPCA as well as others. All of those results would be reviewed before a full commercial process would ever start."
There are a lot of people involved," said Mayor Pepek, "There are residents and government entities. We're not really sure what to expect. All we know is we haven't been through this before. There will be some public forums yet. Crow Wing Power has given us their time line - we're forming an environmental review committee that will consist of some local people. It's still all in the infant stages," said Pepek. "We're into really strong communication on this. I feel kind of like people should know what's going on. We will just follow our instincts and listen to what the government agencies tell us," said
Pepek, "There are two lakes within two miles of the project and both are spring fed, Ruth Lake and Anna Lake. The project is right between the two. We just really have to be careful."
A green light on the project could mean much needed jobs to the city in today's gloomy economy and a financial boom to the little vacationland city."It's very exciting especially in these down economic times something big and hopeful that could benefit all of the area financially," said Kinzer of the possible $20-25 million in tax revenue the project could mean to Emily and area school districts as well as county, state and federal governments and profits to return to its own cooperative members.
"Emily is the City of Lakes," said Mayor Pepek. "It's a beautiful city with a lot of lakes. It's what makes people want to come here so you don't want to destroy that. It could be a big help to the city but we want to put a lot of thought into it."
If everything checks out after the initial testing and the process proves safe for the community of Emily, its residents and its surrounding environment mining could start in earnest in a year, maybe two. The operation is expected to take about five years.
posted by Katie Carter at
11:27 AM
<< Home