Our Environmental Efforts: Green Mining

What if we could mine natural resources in the U.S., protect the environment, and create jobs for Americans? We can, by following strict guidelines for environmental stewardship as well as practices for the protection, reclamation and enhancement of the environment, we are proving that green mining is not only responsible, but can also be profitable.

We go beyond that which is required. Here are some of the ways we establish a "Green Mining" Plan:

• Cooperating with established environmental permit programs to protect storm water from polluting substances and reduce impacts to air quality

• Working to protect and salvage cacti and other native plants

• Developing reclamation plans that outline methods for re-contouring, stabilizing, and re-vegetating areas disturbed by mining and mineral processing in a timely fashion, so that these areas do not become legacy problems for future generations

• Looking for innovative engineering and process management approaches for mineral extraction (cyanide leaching) that contain and neutralize potentially toxic substances, and make it possible to have “zero-discharge” operation

• Using solar power to pump a well that can produce water for mineral processing, thus making it possible to reduce the consumption of community water

• Evaluating office and operations buildings for energy conservation and options for solar and other renewable energy supplementary approaches

• Treating water from mine dewatering to be used for other purposes such as dust suppression

• Conducting biological evaluations of major properties to determine how to best conduct operations to minimize impacts on native flora and fauna


• Conducting historic and archeological resource surveys of major properties to determine how to conduct operations to minimize impacts to these cultural resources, which is important in a history-rich area like Arizona.

Below is a photo of an on-site mobile solar panel unit used by USAR, Inc. The unit is designed to power a water pump that can de-water mine shafts and help to recycle rain water that has collected in those shafts. It is necessary to de-water shafts so we can gain access to potential target areas as well as have the ability to recycle that water for use in keeping dust down and or processing waste material.