Gilt Edge Mine Superfund Site – Phase 2 Ruby Gulch Waste Repository and Cap Remedial Action
Bureau of Reclamation
Deadwood, SD
The Gilt Edge Mine is an abandoned former open pit gold mine site just southeast of the town of Lead in the Northern Black Hills of South Dakota. Gold has been mined at this site since the late 1800s. Several methods have been used over the years to extract the gold including: cyanide leaching, mercury amalgamation, and zinc precipitation. The EPA placed the Gilt Edge Mine site on the National Priorities List (NPL) due to releases of cadmium, cobalt, copper, manganese, lead and zinc into local water sources. DelHur was contracted to construct and complete Phase II of the Ruby Gulch Waste Repository and install a cap over the mine tailings.
The project work scope included:
- Dewatering
- Grubbing and stripping topsoil
- Contouring mine tailings and drainage ditches
- Blasting of rock borrow and drainage ditch areas
- Crushing, processing, and placing various drainage layers
- Production and placement of riprap for erosion protection
- Installation of 25 acres of HDPE geomembrane cover system cap with leak detection system over contoured tailings
