ion Network v. Colo Mined Land

Citations

• 2019 COA 114

Syllabus

In 1999 Piñon Ridge Mining (Piñon) obtained a permit for a uranium mining operation (the site), releasing the company's predecessor from its permit. The site last produced ore in 1989. In 2014, the Division of Reclamation, Mining, and Safety (the Division) approved an initial period of temporary cessation for the site effective in June 2012. Piñon had not extracted minerals since taking over the site because the depressed market price of uranium made production unprofitable. Piñon filed a request for approval of a second period of temporary cessation for the site in May 2017. Information Network for Responsible Mining, Earthworks, and Sheep Mountain Alliance (collectively, the objectors) objected to the request. The Colorado Mined Land Reclamation Board (the Board) granted the request. The district court affirmed the Board's order. On appeal, the objectors asserted that the district court erred in affirming the Board's order, which ignored the plain language of the Colorado Mined Land Reclamation Act (MLRA) when approving a second period of temporary cessation. Under the MLRA, a mining permit may continue in effect even if the mining operation temporarily ceases production for 180 days or more if the operator files a notice of temporary cessation with the Office of Mined Land Reclamation. Production must be resumed within five years of temporary cessation or the operator must file a report requesting an extension of the temporary cessation period. But temporary cessation may not be continued for more than 10 years without terminating the operation and fully complying with the MLRA's reclamation requirements. Under the MLRA, temporary cessation is a factual status, rather than a legal one. A mine is in temporary cessation status once 180 days have passed without production, even if the Division or the Board has not received or acted upon the required notice. Here, because the site's period of temporary cessation began no later than 1999, production had to resume by 2