Code of Federal Regulations Title 40. Protection of Environment § 40.440.132 General definitions

(a) “Active mining area” is a place where work or other activity related to the extraction, removal, or recovery of metal ore is being conducted, except, with respect to surface mines, any area of land on or in which grading has been completed to return the earth to desired contour and reclamation work has begun.

(b) “Annual precipitation” and “annual evaporation” are the mean annual precipitation and mean annual lake evaporation, respectively, as established by the U.S. Department of Commerce, Environmental Science Services Administration, Environmental Data Services, or equivalent regional rainfall and evaporation data.

(c) “Appropriate treatment of the recycle water” in Subpart J, § 440.104 includes, but is not limited to pH adjustment, settling and pH adjustment, settling, and mixed media filtration.

(d) “Groundwater infiltration” in § 440.131 means that water which enters the treatment facility as a result of the interception of natural springs, aquifers, or run-off which percolates into the ground and seeps into the treatment facility's tailings pond or wastewater holding facility and that cannot be diverted by ditching or grouting the tailings pond or wastewater holding facility.

(e) “In-situ leach methods” means the processes involving the purposeful introduction of suitable leaching solutions into a uranium ore body to dissolve the valuable minerals in place and the purposeful leaching of uranium ore in a static or semistatic condition either by gravity through an open pile, or by flooding a confined ore pile. It does not include the natural dissolution of uranium by ground waters, the incidental leaching of uranium by mine drainage, nor the rehabilitation of aquifiers and the monitoring of these aquifiers.

(f) “Mill” is a preparation facility within which the metal ore is cleaned, concentrated, or otherwise processed before it is shipped to the customer, refiner, smelter, or manufacturer. A mill includes all ancillary operations and structures necessary to clean, concentrate, or otherwise process metal ore, such as ore and gangue storage areas and loading facilities.

(g) “Mine” is an active mining area, including all land and property placed under, or above the surface of such land, used in or resulting from the work of extracting metal ore or minerals from their natural deposits by any means or method, including secondary recovery of metal ore from refuse or other storage piles, wastes, or rock dumps and mill tailings derived from the mining, cleaning, or concentration of metal ores.

(h) “Mine drainage” means any water drained, pumped, or siphoned from a mine.

(i) “Ten (10)–year, 24–hour precipitation event” is the maximum 24–hour precipitation event with a probable recurrence interval of once in 10 years as established by the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Weather Service, or equivalent regional or rainfall probability information.

(j) “U” (Uranium) is measured by the procedure discussed in 40 CFR 141.25(b)(2), or an equivalent method.