A large number of abandoned hard rock mines exist in Colorado and other mountain west states, many on public property. Public pressure and resulting policy changes have become a driving force in the reclamation of these sites. Two of the key reclamation issues for these sites is the occurrence of acid forming materials (AFMs) in mine soils, and acid mine drainage (AMD) issuing from mine adits. An AMD treatment system design project for the Forest Queen mine in Colorado's San Juan mountains raised the need for a simple, useable method for analysis of mine land soils, both for suitability as a construction material, and to determine the AFM content and potential for acid release. We have developed a simple, stepwise, go-no go test for the analysis of mine soils. Samples were collected from a variety of sites in the Silverton, CO area, and subjected to three tiers of tests including: paste pH, Eh, and I 0% HCl fizz test; then total digestion in HNO,IHCl, neutralization •potential, exposure to meteoric water, and toxicity content leaching procedure (TCLP). All elemental analyses were performed with an inductively-coupled plasma (ICP) spectrometer. Elimination of samples via the first two testing tiers left two remaining samples, which were subsequently subjected to column and sequential batch tests, with further elemental analysis by ICP. Based on these tests, one sample was chosen for suitability as a construction material for the Forest Queen treatment system basins. Further simplification, and testing on two pairs of independent soil samples, has resulted in a final analytical method suitable for general use.
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