Mined by means of air hammers as well as pickaxes, bereft of dust control or consistent monitoring of volatile methane gas, the pocitos utilize methods old-fashioned within the United States a century before.

Two latest disasters that killed 25 miners exposed the ancient state of affairs. Last week, 13 miners drowned after a mine called La Espuelita flooded and the men couldn’t flee. The catastrophe came four months following another pocito, La Morita No. 49, exploded and killed 12.

Each one of the pocitos, approximately 30 miles apart in Mexico’s solitary coal-mining region, had a solitary vertical bore, violating safety standards adopted within Mexico and other countries long ago.

“Today, American coal mines are required to have a minimum of 2 shafts. That’s something that we learned way back in the 19th century,” said mine engineering Lecturer Chris Haycocks of the Virginia Polytechnic Institute.

Small seams of coal resembling those that pocitos mine are disregarded by up to date American operations, said Jerry Herndon of the United States Mine Health and Safety Academy in West Virginia.

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/special_reports/70585887.html

This is just an excerpt from a much longer story dealing with the impact of coal mine and coal mine dust control. the reason for bringing this issue to the forefront here is because many of the coal mine operations that are dealing with dust control should be looking at SCI’s Haul Road dust control products to lower their water consumption. Dust control in the long term can be a source of savings when done right. Not only will you aid the environment by cutting back on coal dust emissions, but you will also lower the cost of legal fees when dealing with the effects of un-controlled dust. here is a short pieces of the full story.

For LJ Turner in Wyoming, coal mining is slowly taking away the vast acreage of his ranch.

"They’ve taken away our land, they’re taking away our water, they’re destroying our air – this is affecting us," said Turner. "We’ve been ranching on government leases since the 1930s, and (mining) has taken 6,000 acres from us so far." Campbell County, Wyoming, where Turner resides, produces a whopping 35% of the nation’s coal from a series of mining complexes that lay waste to miles of pristine prairie.

Turner said thankfully his family has 10,000 deeded acres that they cannot take away, but that land is still affected because the Powder River Basin mining operations are affecting the water.

"They’re depleting the surface aquifers very heavily," he explained. "And the coal bed methane is depleting the deeper aquifers, so we’re losing well water and creek water."

The Powder River Basin includes the nation’s largest surface mine, the Black Thunder Mine. Aquifers and rivers that once irrigated crops and watered cattle are now being used for power plants and dust suppression. Across the prairies and mountains of the Basin, communities have been divided. The region, once home to numerous Native tribes and then family ranches, is now a patchwork of coal mines, power lines, rail lines, and oil and gas wells.

For Otto Braided Hair, it was very important to share the realities of mining to folks who may not think about where their electricity comes from.

"Within minutes of where we live, in almost any direction, there is on-going destruction from coal mining," he said of his home in southeast Montana. "The blues skies are streaked with a brown haze of pollution, and the sacred waters are being threatened and damaged due to coal bed methane development, among other indications of disregard to the environment."

Otto said he wants to encourage people everywhere to think about more than just themselves.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-nilles/the-true-impact-of-coal-m_b_340420.html

Many municipalities are having trouble these days complying with the federal governments mandates on dust control Why? simply put, the banks have cut off credit to the consumers, which in turn has killed the consumer market which has killed many support industries which have ended many jobs thus creating a shortfall in the amount of revenue everyone is taking in… Including local and state governments. Is this accidental, I don’t think so but regardless, Dust control is mandated by the federal government and must be paid for some how. Some would say raise taxes to keep the coffers full. That only takes more away from the people that still have jobs. The end effect is the government gets larger and the citizens supporting said government get poorer. is this the dust road we wish to travel. I don’t think so. SCI can help the local governments by aiding them in meeting these mandated requirements while at the same time conserving their precious resources. This next story is not only about dust Control it is about survival of a small town in the USA.

An increase in the Nye County gas tax from 4 cents per gallon to 7 cents was a necessity in light of a 32 percent decline in gas tax revenues, the Nye County Regional Transportation Commission decided Monday.

But in light of an expected onslaught of opposition, the RTC punted.

They passed a motion by Nye County Commissioner Butch Borasky to continue the discussion until next year to see if the economy improves.

"The only thing I got to say is it’s bad timing," Borasky said.

Borasky said the best time to pass a gas tax increase would have been a few years ago when the economy was booming. But he said the increase could be put on the 2010 ballot to let voters decide.

That suggestion was a little more palatable to RTC member Cameron McRae, a former Nye County commissioner who remembered the outcry the last time it was attempted in July 20, 1999, when the commission decided not to raise the tax by a 4-0 vote. It was also rejected in October 1991.

"We had our hat handed to us," McRae recalled.

RTC member Bob Howard said gas prices are going up — noting the price of oil hit $79 per barrel Monday — but the county is not getting more of it.

Howard said with more people driving hybrid cars the revenues will be even less.

The RTC, which meets quarterly, has control over the 4-cent gas tax money and a 1/4-cent sales tax for road improvements.

"It never has been and it never will be what this county needs because they will never overcome the 18,000 square miles," McRae said.

Fewer people are driving because of the economy, Commissioner Lorinda Wichman said. But she offered some consolation — fewer motorists will be out driving the roads that need maintenance.

Howard wondered, would the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency come after Nye County if it can’t afford to chip seal a bunch of new roads next year to comply with dust control standards?

"You can’t squeeze blood out of a turnip," McRae replied.

The RTC also approved a request by Nye County Acting Public Works Director Dave Fanning to do some engineering work on rebuilding Dandelion Street from Highway 160 down to Calvada Boulevard. That project would be considered in the 2011-12 fiscal year, he said.

"It needs to be worked pretty badly. It’s a bad road," Fanning said.

Nye County will receive $379,358 from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, Fanning said, also known as the stimulus package. It will be used for widening Gamebird Road from Pahrump Valley Boulevard to Homestead Road. He said it was the only road that met the road classification for the money.

Fanning said the county would have to contribute another $300,000 from other funds to get that widening work done.

The 15 rural counties and 11 cities split up $7 million in stimulus money. Projects must be "shovel ready" by December.

ANCHORAGE – When the north wind blows in Seward, dust flies off a large pile of coal and covers the town’s scenic boat harbor in black grit.

"It is just very, very, very dirty. It piles up against homes. I get reports of it in windowsills, inside locked cars, inside boats. Folks come back after the winter and find piles of it inside their locked up boats," said Russ Maddox with the Resurrection Bay Conservation Alliance.

That local group has tried for years to fix the problem, and now three conservation groups are threatening to file a lawsuit against Alaska Railroad Corp. and Aurora Energy Services LLC, alleging they are discharging coal without a permit into Resurrection Bay – a popular destination for summer tourists.

Trustees for Alaska, a public interest law firm representing the Alaska Center for the Environment, Alaska Community on Toxics and the Alaska chapter of the Sierra Club late last month issued a 60-day notice of intent to sue.

The groups accuse the railroad and Aurora Energy of violating the federal Clean Water Act.

Brian Litmans, attorney for Trustees for Alaska, said the notice gives the railroad time to fix the problem or get a federal permit to discharge coal into the bay.

Litmans said when the wind blows from the north, plumes of coal dust rise off the pile and settle on the water. When the coal is scooped up off the pile and loaded onto the conveyor belt, more dust is put into the air. Even more dust is generated when the coal is loaded onto ships.

Besides the dust, coal chunks fall off the conveyor belt and into the bay, he said.

"We think it is really time to implement the engineering and other fixes that can prevent this problem from continuing in the future," said Pam Miller, executive director of the Alaska Community Action on Toxics.

Inhaling coal dust is associated with serious health problems, including pulmonary disease, bronchitis and emphysema, she said.

The Alaska Railroad has owned the Seward Coal Loading Facility for six years and operates it in partnership with Aurora Energy, which is an affiliate of the Usibelli coal mine near Healy.

The coal is taken by rail to Seward where it is stored until a conveyor belt loads it onto ships headed for Chile, China and Korea.

Wendy Lindskoog, the railroad’s assistant vice president, said the corporation takes environmental stewardship seriously and has made numerous improvements to the coal loading facility, and more are planned.

More than $1 million has been spent on safety, operation and environmental improvements since the railroad took over, she said.

Among them: seals on openings to control dust, dust control bars along the conveyor belts and stacker reclaimer, a new transfer chute on the ship loader to minimize incidental spillage, skirting along the ship loader belt and ensuring the dust control system works in freezing weather.

The facility was built in 1984 as a state economic development project to engage in the world coal market. The coal was transported from Healy to Seward under a contract with Suneel Alaska Corp., the purchaser of coal for the Korean market.

In 2003, the railroad received a federal grant to buy the operation. Hyundai ran it until January 2007, when the railroad entered into an operating agreement with Aurora Energy Services in Seward.

When Suneel Alaska Corp. ran the facility, it was permitted as a coal-processing center and was allowed under a permit to emit 87 metric tons of coal dust annually, Maddox said.

When the railroad took over, it was reclassified as a storage facility, even though nothing changed in its operation, he said. As a storage facility, the railroad doesn’t need a coal dust permit.

Two air quality violation notices have been issued since the railroad took over the operation, Lindskoog said. One was in April 2007 and the other one was in March 2008. The railroad and AES are negotiating with the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation to resolve the violations, she said.

http://www.juneauempire.com/stories/111109/sta_515209558.shtml

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that when banks cut off credit lines to consumers the backlash reaches all the way to city hall. Many people blame the mess on the sub-prime home owners. But the FBI found that 80% of the illegal activity was promoted by the bankers and not the borrowers. So what ya gonna do.. Give the banks a bailout. while the rest of the human race suffers for playing by the rules, the bankers head out on the government funded yachts to drink it up with the politicians that gave them the free money. So let the small towns suffer and let the dust fly in the air for they don’t give a damn. Just be sure to pay your bills on time or they will take your town.

Cash flow is of great concern for Monticello City Manager Myron Lee.  At the October 27 meeting of the Monticello City Council, Lee presented current sales tax deposits from the Utah State Tax Commission.

After months of budget discussion earlier in the year, the council had decided to raise sales tax projections from $305,000 (the amount received in 2008) to $346,000 in order to balance city budgets.

However, based on the latest numbers, sales tax collections are headed in the wrong direction.  After one third of the budget year, sales tax revenues are down more than $50,000 from 2008.

A major factor in the drop is lower gas prices. The City had received $9486 from natural gas taxes at this point in 2008. The 2009 numbers are less than half, at $4665.

The lower rates are good for consumers, but the city is taking a hit.  The City is also hit hard by the loss of resort community status.
There is also concern that the numbers reported are largely before road construction began. Many Monticello businesses report lower sales during road construction.

If the trend continues, the City may face a shortfall of $100,000 or more.

Lee said the council needs to think of other ways to solve the problem if sales tax stays down for the remainder of the year.
Mayor Doug Allen suggested a review of the budget each month to stay on top of the problem.

In other business, residents of 500 North approached the council with a list of complaints. Group spokesman Doug Aiken said they would like to have the road moved up on the list of paving and curb and gutter projects.

They expressed concern over flooding from drainage, dust control, lack of gravel on the road, weeds in vacant lots, and cars increasing speed on the gravel portion of the road.  There is also concern over cars parking in the red zone at the intersection of 500 North and Main, causing a hazard when entering traffic on Main Street.

Aiken suggested several ideas, including additional speed limit signs, children at play signs, more police patrols, and speed bumps.
There are six new homes in the unpaved section of 500 North, in addition to 14 trailers in the mobile home park at the end of the street. A number of children walk to and from school on the road.

The residents were told that paving 500 North is not on either the short or medium range plan, which puts it at least 10 years out.  Mayor Allen said that when a subdivision is typically built, the developer to must put in infrastructure, including roads and curb and gutter. It did not happen on 500 North when a subdivision was put on an existing, non-improved city road.

Allen suggested that the City could help with weed, signs, parking, and drainage, as well as increased traffic enforcement.  He added that residents can share the cost for curb and gutter with the city, but until the road is paved, it may not be in residnt’s best interest to put it in.

As far as paving the road, Allen said they are willing to help come up with ideas to get the road paved. but added, “It’s not just a matter of us wanting to or not, it’s a matter of funding.”

Allen asked if the residents are willing to contribute to the funding, pointing out that it may facilitate it faster.
Marcie Aiken expressed frustration, “You don’t seem to want to admit this is a city road. This is not our road. If you sign the road over to us citizens, we will take care of it.”

Allen said that 500 North is an unimproved city road. Councilman Scott Frost said when you buy a lot on an unimproved road, you should know you will have to wait until the city has money to improve the road.  Doug Aiken said that is why they are coming at this time, as the city is receiving additional money over the next few years for road work.

Allen said they will try to move it up on the priority list, which is put together by city staff.  He said he would love to pave the entire road, but a price tag of possibly $2-3 million is a significant cost to the city.

Lee suggested that they start with cost estimates and then break it down to see what it will take to pave the street. He said there is no doubt the road is used by other residents and it would serve everyone to have it paved, but at what cost.

Councilman Jeremy Hoggard said that with the new homes on the street, it may need to be reprioritized and move up the list. The residents were encouraged to check back to see what the city does to address their concerns.

Myron Lee presented a final plan for the new Monticello swimming pool.  Construction has begun and is scheduled for completion in June, 2010.  The city received a $100,000 donation from the Dolores and George S. Eccles Foundation. A Community Impact Board loan has a $45,000 per year payment beginning in 2012.   The project budget is $2.197 million. Lee is “cautiously optimistic” to complete the project by June and within the budget.

Mayor Allen praised the efforts of community members to see the project take place.  He credited the tenacity of the youth of the community and the “penny drive” as being the key to receiving the Eccles grant, as well as the CIB funding.  Allen expressed thanks to the schools, parents, and youth.

Fritz Pipkin, of the Victims of Mill Tailings Exposure committee, asked for permission to build an information kiosk at the mill site property.  Pipkin said grant funding will pay for the kiosk.

Mayor Allen said he didn’t think they would need permission from the Department of Energy, but suggested that they coordinate with the City Public Works Department.

The council approved a change to the general license provisions of the city.  The change stipulates that youth are exempt from business licenses requirements.  Before being approved, Councilman Brad Randall expressed concern that it opens the door for other “grey areas” in business license requirements.

Mayor Allen said that the change is driven by a question by a concerned citizen.  Councilman Frost said that since there is an issue of concern, the change offers clarification for the future.

Councilmen Scott Shakespeare and Frost voted in favor of the change, with Councilmen Hoggard and Randall against.  Mayor Allen broke the tie, voting in favor of the change.

When formed the tiny droplets will mix with the highly turbulent airflow generated by the Buffalo Turbine 14" single stage turbine, and will be projected into the air. The 50-200 micron size droplets will collect and trap airborne Dust Particulates and odours, ultimately resulting in an immediate reduction of pollution on site.

No generator is required for this diesel-driven, portable unit. Wireless nozzle and throttle control and oscillating stand and a reach of 40 m provides controlled dust suppression for a range of sites.

Now i can see the residents point of view as well as Mr. White’s. It takes time to complete projects like this and staging is part of the game. You don’t redo you dust control every day. The people have a right to clean air and the builder has the obligation to keep it that way. Bu some times we each have to think of the others situation. I guess if he has started with a dust control product like Top-Seal from the very start he would have been in better shape. I can promise you it would have been less than 10k per day.

The state’s Department of Ecology issued a violations notice and order to developer Calvin White for not taking care of dust control problems at two East Wenatchee subdivisions he has been in the process of developing since 2006.

The notice of violations and order, dated Sept. 23, indicates White could face a $10,000 civil penalty each day for each violation if he does not take corrective action.

White has 30 days to appeal the corrective order the DOE issued along with the violations notice; but in the past two weeks, he has been busy at Aspen Hills and Calalina Crest subdivisions north of East Wenatchee. He put in a road, leveled a mountainous pile of dirt and hydroseeded the two properties with an erosion-control seed mix.

Susan Billings, DOE’s section manager for the Central Regional Air Quality Section out of Yakima, said the department has received steady complaints from neighbors of the two subdivision sites.

The notice said neighbors provided detailed reports about ongoing impacts to their health and welfare, damage to their property and inability to enjoy their residences indoors or outside.

Dave Hulligan, whose duplex was situated next to a nearly 60-foot-high pile of soil on White’s land until White leveled it Thursday, said, “It’s almost like living in a sandstorm.”

He said if his garage door is open for even a few minutes, the fine particulate fills up his tool cases.

“My mom, who is staying with me, has asthma, and at times it is impossible for her to breathe,” Hulligan said.

Another neighbor, Rita Sortino, said her swimming pool was unusable for a couple months because of all the blowing dust. She said she had to purchase special equipment to clean the pool.

“And when I turn on my clothes dryer, you can just hear the sand in there,” she said, adding one of her dogs “had allergy fits” from being exposed to all the dust.

Bob Corkrum, another neighbor who made three trips to Yakima to deliver photos and dust samples to DOE, said the dust is so bad at times that no one can sit outside and enjoy their decks or have people over for barbecues. He said he’s had to go to the doctor several times because of problems with his lungs and he hasn’t been able to hire anyone to paint his house because of the constant layer of dust coating his house.

Corkrum said White occasionally watered the land to keep the dust at bay.

“But it’s 11 acres,” he said. “Maybe he shouldn’t have leveled it all at once. Then it would still have some natural vegetation on it to keep the dust down.”

Corkrum said for the past three years, White has done virtually nothing with the property except “push plenty of dirt around. He’s been like a kid with a Tonka toy.”

The World caught up with White on Friday at the Aspen Hills subdivision and asked if the spate of recent activity has anything to do with the violation notices.

He said that he was mostly just finishing up the project so that he could start selling lots, but the notices may have factored in somewhat.

When asked why he didn’t address the dust problem years ago when neighbors first started complaining, he said he wouldn’t comment because of the pending issue with DOE.

Corkrum said he is very upset with the county and the DOE. “Why did it take three years for these notices to go out? We are taxpayers and they are supposed to be protecting citizens,” he said.

Douglas County does not have an air-quality authority, said Planning Director Mark Kulaas, which is why neighbors had to take their case to the state.

He said that when the county was first contacted by the neighbors about the problem, they notified DOE right away. “We also contacted Calvin (White) and advised him that he needed to get water down. I understand he also did some seeding, but because it wasn’t hydroseeded, it didn’t take,” Kulaas said.

“It’s not that we weren’t doing anything,” he said. “And it’s not that we weren’t unsympathetic; but we didn’t have the authority to do anything.”

Kulaas said the county was just as frustrated as the neighbors at the DOE’s slow pace addressing the complaints.

Billings said dust control is an area where the DOE took big budget cuts.

“But we did get involved because it’s an extreme case,” she said, adding that she worked closely with White to try and help him comply and educate him about techniques he could emply to try and keep the dust down.

Kulaas said he definitely understands budget cuts, “But when the problem appears so severe and generates as many complaints as this has, then something should be done, no matter how bad the budget constraints.”

Billings said she is encouraged by White’s recent activity at the two subdivisions, but added that the department is still deciding whether penalties should be implemented.

Whilst footprint and headroom were key reasons why O Kay Engineering selected Dantherm, they also wanted to use a single supplier for all the dust control needs. To this end, Dantherm also supplied four air knives with dedicated blower fans rated at 1870m³/h each associated with a Dantherm NFV material separator. Nordfab QF clipped and FL ducting, manufactured by Dantherm, was used throughout, extracting from purpose designed hoods for each function. A further requirement was full ATEX compliance for all relevant components. The new filter units, rotary valves and material separators  have all been externally tested and carry ATEX EC-Type Examination certificates.

Working in close cooperation with the customer, Dantherm’s  project team Adrian Sharpe and Chris Mumford were able to supply every aspect of the dust control system unobtrusively to meet the exacting needs of the processes.

Dantherm Filtration Ltd.,
Limewood Approach,
Seacroft , Leeds LS14 1NG

County commissioners voted 5-0 to adopt the next phase of the five-year surface treatment plan, which allocates money for dust control to limerock roads most in need.

County Engineer Charles Mixsone said county commissioners have approved putting $390,000 into its limerock road surface treatment program to help with dust control.

During the next five years, the program will apply surface treatment for dust control on roughly 15 miles of selected limerock roads in the county. That amounts to three miles per year for five years.

The roads getting treated fall into certain categories, including amount of traffic, proximity to major highways and number of people who live on the street.

Roads targeted for treatment in 2010 include Sharon Court, Lewis Lane, August Avenue and Batten Road.

This story is not uncommon to us. many time good intentions don’t always end up the way we want them to. In this case the method used for erosion control is not exactly panning out the way they expected, now they have a dust control problem as well as an erosion control nightmare about to take place.

Had anyone else built this hillside near the U.S.-Mexico border, it would look nothing like it does. The barren hill would be alive with native plants, the earth would be solidly rooted and not a threat to tumble down into the Tijuana Estuary, a lush, 2,500-acre salt marsh that starts 600 feet away.

But along the newly constructed border fence near the Pacific Ocean in Border Field State Park, inch-thick tan clumps of seeds and mulch still blanket the ground. They haven’t been watered, so no plants have grown.

When Top-Seal is used for erosion control and or dust control, the application can be adjusted so that the end result will promote growth of new vegetation. In farming there is a practice called moisture banking. The objective is to leave the soil undisturbed after there has been a long soaking rain. This rain will create a protective crust on the surface of the soil. This crust will help keep the moisture in the soil. When Top-Seal is used to create this protective layer for either erosion control or dust control, the effects are even more drastic. In the long run, the moisture that is banked and the sealed, is there for the seeds to utilize for growth.

Were it anyone else’s project, state regulators would’ve required irrigation to ensure that plants grew. But the federal government is responsible for the $59 million effort to complete and reinforce 3.5 miles of border fence separating San Diego and Tijuana. The Department of Homeland Security exempted itself from eight federal laws and any related state laws that would have regulated the project’s environmental impacts.

Because the project is exempt from the federal Clean Water Act, state water regulators have no jurisdiction.

Homeland Security officials sought the waiver power in 2005 to accelerate fence construction in San Diego and across the Southwest, saying that national security needs trumped environmental concerns. That power has accelerated construction from San Diego to Brownsville, as the agency has waived laws across 550 miles of the border. To date, 633 miles of fence have been built at a cost of $2.4 billion.

The department made the same promise each time it waived laws like the Clean Water Act and Clean Air Act: Though we’re now exempt from federal and state environmental regulation, we’re still committed to the environment.

But as construction continues across the Southwest, the project’s impacts in Border Field State Park and in another federal reserve further east raise questions about the sincerity of the government’s commitment.

Clay Phillips, the California State Parks superintendent who oversees Border Field and the estuary, said that promise hasn’t been fulfilled there. Mitigation of the fence’s environmental impacts has "failed miserably," Phillips said.

Phillips worries that winter rains will wash soil off the hills into the nearby estuary he oversees, which is home to several sensitive species and already filling with sediment swept in from Tijuana. Sediment raises the level of the ground, stopping the twice-daily tidal flushing that keeps the wetlands wet.

Army Corps of Engineers contractors completed the fence separating San Diego and Tijuana in July. They filled in the notorious cross-border canyon known as Smuggler’s Gulch, added a second layer of steel fencing and built a road for Border Patrol vehicles running parallel to the fence. The gulch, once a deep canyon, is now filled with an earthen berm more than 100 feet tall.

Though native plant seeds were sprayed across the berm and other newly created hillsides in Border Field State Park, Phillips said the federal government never irrigated them. Only a handful of plants grew. Other hills have none.

"They sprayed it (with seed) and hoped for the best," Phillips said. "It was a waste. A token gesture."
A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokeswoman, Jenny Burke, said the project was built to Caltrans’ erosion standards. The agency will "monitor the situation and is considering other actions as required."

John Robertus, executive officer of the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board, the local water pollution police, said the project doesn’t have all the safeguards his agency would’ve required. He said if the board had jurisdiction, it would’ve required temporary irrigation to ensure plants grew. Robertus said he, too, is concerned about the project’s potential impacts on the estuary.

Fence construction has left a mark on other areas in San Diego County greater than what would’ve been allowed without the waiver. Further east in the federally protected Otay Mountain Wilderness, a road built along a new four-mile section of fence also left barren hills, said Joyce Schlachter, a wildlife biologist with the federal Bureau of Land Management, which oversees the area.

"When we get any rain, it’s going to be an erosion nightmare," Schlachter said. Seeds have been sprayed there, too, but not watered, she said. No plants have grown.

The impacts on Otay Mountain stretch beyond possible erosion. Phalanxes of dump trucks going to work on the fence have rumbled up and down a dirt road, spreading clouds of dust as far as 30 feet away, blanketing Tecate cypress, a rare tree found only on three peaks in San Diego County. (Its range extends into Mexico.) The tree, a bushy evergreen, provides food for the Thorne’s hairstreak butterfly, a rare thumbnail-sized insect that feeds only on the cypress and that has been suffering from too-frequent fires on the mountain.

Construction crews cut down more than 100 cypress that survived a massive 2003 wildfire to widen an existing road for construction vehicles, Schlachter said.

If laws hadn’t been waived, the Bureau would have required construction crews to minimize their impact on the trees, she said. Homeland Security officials consulted with the Bureau, Schlachter said, then didn’t follow all of its advice.

"When it came right down to it, they did what they wanted to do," Schlachter said. "And they knew they couldn’t be stopped. We did not have control over it."

Kathy Williams, a San Diego State biology professor studying the butterfly, said the dust poses "potentially a really serious problem" for the Thorne’s hairstreak and the cypress.

Williams has reared a small number of Thorne’s caterpillars on both dusty and clean leaves in her laboratory. Results from the on-going experiment so far indicate that more caterpillars survived on clean leaves, she said.

Before construction began last year, Williams said the roadside habitat looked much healthier. She saw more butterflies last year than she did this year, though she noted that population sizes vary annually.

"Now it’s obviously degraded habitat," she said, noting that rainfall may help clean the leaves. "The appearance of the quality of the site is strikingly different."

Burke, the Customs and Border Protection spokeswoman, said the agency consulted with U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials about the Otay project and routinely wets the road to keep dust down. She said Customs and Border Protection will monitor the dust and maintain the roads "to their construction standard," and could periodically apply "dust-control agents," which include sap.

Those efforts haven’t always worked well. Sap was sprayed on trees beyond the road’s edge, Schlachter said. Dust stuck on top of the sap, she said, making the trees’ survival questionable. "They’re creating more risk to the plants," she said. "That’s an issue."

On at least one occasion, crews didn’t water the road — even though they had the necessary equipment on hand. One morning in June, a water truck escorted dump trucks to the work site but didn’t spray any water. As the trucks wound through the wilderness past Tecate cypress, choking clouds of dust followed.

U.S. Rep. Susan Davis, D-San Diego, whose district includes Border Field State Park, said in a statement that she wants more done immediately to address the fence’s environmental impacts.

"Many people, including myself, expressed strong concerns about the border fence and the implications of exempting the construction of the fence from environmental laws," Davis said. "Unfortunately, those concerns are becoming a reality. I hope the Department of Homeland Security will continue to work with Congress and local officials in finding an immediate solution and work toward a permanent one."
A representative of an environmental group that opposed the fence because of concerns about erosion said its construction reinforced the reasons for his opposition. Jim Peugh, conservation chairman of the San Diego Audubon Society, said he hopes the fence serves as an example of why environmental laws should never be waived.

"The idea of building something without seeing how you’re going to maintain it — it’s just going to fail," Peugh said. "That’s an insane thing to do. And this project proves that beyond a doubt."

Please contact Rob Davis directly at rob.davis@voiceofsandiego.org and follow him on Twitter: twitter.com/robwdavis. And set the tone of the debate with a letter to the editor.