$517,000 for cleanup of Mount Diablo mine

Mine cleanup

$517,000 for cleanup of Mount Diablo mine
Jane Kay
Friday, February 1, 2008


Contra Costa County officials will receive $517,000 to start the cleanup of an abandoned Mount Diablo mine that leaks mercury into San Francisco Bay.

The county had ranked the cleanup as the top priority for federal funds in 2008. Reps. Jerry McNerney, George Miller and Ellen Tauscher - all East Bay Democrats - announced Thursday that they had secured a portion of the needed funds.

The Mount Diablo Mercury Mine drains into the Marsh Creek watershed near Oakley and Brentwood before eventually reaching the bay. The bay's largest source of mercury is from now-closed gold and mercury mines. The Mount Diablo mine produced mercury between the 1860s and the 1950s on a 14-acre site.

Mitch Avalon, deputy public works director of Contra Costa County Public Works Department, said the mine, which is the only one in the county, pollutes fish in the Marsh Creek flood-control reservoir.

Mercury, a neurotoxin and a particular danger to children, is one of the primary contaminants found in the bay's fish, which are prized by sports anglers. There is no commercial fishing in the bay except for herring and some bait fish.

The funding will come through the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and will be used to finance preliminary design and planning studies, which are expected to cost about $1 million. Thus far, there has been no money appropriated for further work.

This article appeared on page B - 3 of the San Francisco Chronicle