The Department of Natural Resources has given Gogebic Taconite (GTAC) the go-ahead for removing 2,400 tons of rock in the Penokee Hills for sampling, which the company is expected to start work on later this week.
GTAC had proposed to build an access road to at least one of the three sites they’ll be sampling. However, because current logging roads and railroad grades are frozen, company spokesperson Bob Seitz said it’s possible to use those roads for removing the samples with minimal impact: “We’ll just scoop it out, get it in trucks, and haul it out.”
No new roads means no additional environmental impact, so the company won’t need a stormwater run-off permit from the DNR.
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DNR hydrogeologist Larry Lynch says two of the sites were already blasted by U.S. Steel, which explored the area in 1960.
“(On) sites one and two, companies had done some previous blasting so the rock is loose and they’re just using typical excavating equipment to pick the rock up and load it on to vehicles,” said Lynch. “(On) Site 5, there wasn’t blasting done, so they have to break the rock up, and they’re proposing to use a rock hammer to do it.”
Lynch said explosives won’t be needed.
About 800 tons of rocks will be taken from each of the three sites, all in Iron County. The rocks will be sent to a facility on Minnesota’s Iron Range for analysis of content and density for a future milling operation. That in turn will be used by GTAC to apply for a permit to build a 4.5-mile-long open pit iron ore mine in the Penokee Hills.
The application for the mine may still be a year away.
Correction: The radio version of this story incorrectly said that rock samples would be analyzed for absetosform content.
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