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>> Tom Zinnen: Welcome,  

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everyone, to Wednesday Nite 
at the Lab.  

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My name is Tom Zinnen. 
I work here at the Biotechnology  

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Center at UW-Madison. 
I also work for UW Extension  

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Cooperative Extension, and on 
behalf of those organizations  

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and our sponsors, 
Wisconsin Public Television,  

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Wisconsin Alumni Association, 
the UW Madison Science Alliance  

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and the PLATO group, thanks 
for coming to Wednesday Nite  

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at the Lab. 
We do this every Wednesday  

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night, 50 times a year. 
Tonight I'm delighted to be able  

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to introduce to you, Bruce Brown 
who is a colleague of mine who  

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also works for the cooperative 
extension.  

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He works for the Wisconsin 
Geological and Natural History  

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Survey here in town. 
He gets to work on one of the  

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more interesting and soon to be, 
well, I think it's fair to say  

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it's rather controversial, the 
whole issue of frac sands here  

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in Wisconsin. 
So please join me in welcoming  

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Bruce Brown to Wednesday Nite at 
the Lab.  

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[APPLAUSE]  

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>> Bruce Brown: Thank you very 
much.  

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I'm quite pleased to see the 
size of the crowd we've got  

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tonight. 
Apparently this is an issue that  

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has caught a few people's 
attention.  

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I was rather fearing for a while 
that a talk about sand was about  

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the last thing anybody was going 
to want to hear.  

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But if you have at least paid 
any attention to the newspapers  

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or listened to any of the media, 
you can't help but have heard  

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about various controversy about 
hydrofracking and the production  

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of oil and natural gas and about 
the fact that we've really  

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undergone something very much 
akin to a gold rush in western  

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Wisconsin in this last year in 
terms of companies coming in and  

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opening up mines to get the type 
of sand that they need for  

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hydrofracking. 
And I'm going to try to give you  

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an idea tonight a little bit 
about why are they coming here.  

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Why is our resource particularly 
better than elsewhere?  

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I'm going to start with the 
basic process of frac sand, a  

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little bit about what the 
characteristics of good material  

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are, why Wisconsin is a major 
target, explain a bit about the  

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geology of the state that has 
helped form this particular  

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material and then go into a few 
of the issues that have come up  

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in local zoning and in the 
counties coping with this huge  

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influx. 
A lot of counties out in western  

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Wisconsin basically were, their 
non-metallic mining regulation  

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program was basically five or 
six big old hilltop limestone  

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quarries, and that's about all 
they had to deal with.  

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A county like Trempealeau 
suddenly has 20 applications for  

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hydrofrac sand mines, and this 
has basically overwhelmed them  

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and needless to say it's kept me 
pretty busy.  

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So I'm going to start out with 
basically looking at what is  

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hydrofracking and how do you 
hydrofrac a well.  

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Well, the principles of 
hydrofracking are shown down  

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here in the lower left. 
You have an oil well or a gas  

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well. 
In the past, the basic  

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technology was to vertical 
drill, and hydrofracking is not  

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something that's new. 
This is a technology that's been  

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around since just post-World War 
II, since the 1940s.  

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Basically, it was a vertical 
drill hole, they would pump down  

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pressure, fracture the formation 
a bit to help oil flow in.  

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It was a useful technique for 
secondary recovery of oil and  

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worked very well. 
Now the thing that is the new  

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development in the last few 
years is horizontal drilling.  

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We've got technology today, all 
of you have seen these little  

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rigs that they drill in cables 
for putting in fiber optics or  

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whatever else, but they can 
drill horizontally and follow  

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pretty closely on a straight 
line.  

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Well, these oil drillers that 
are currently developing the gas  

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fields and oil fields where 
we're using most the hydrofrac  

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sand, they can drill out a mile 
almost horizontally.  

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So that gives them a chance to 
go right out through the  

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formation and then they frac the 
formation by pumping down very  

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high pressure fluids, a mixture 
of a number of things, water  

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being the major ingredient with 
some polymers in there to help  

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keep the sand in suspension, but 
all these trucks up here, if you  

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see in this upper photo, these 
are all big compressor rigs from  

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oil field service companies, all 
hooked in tandem to a well which  

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is somewhere here in the middle. 
Most of these big trailers out  

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here that you see on the outside 
are filled up with sand which is  

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the hydrofrac sand. 
Have I got a mic that's not  

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working here?  

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All right, well that's a fair 
trade.  

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[LAUGHTER] 
To me it doesn't sound  

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much different. 
But anyway, what we have  

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up here, a bunch of compressor 
trucks.  

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These are all hooked in tandem 
pumping a very high pressure in  

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this formation down here to the 
point where it actually  

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fractures the rock around the 
borehole.  

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It will break that rock up, 
which is usually a very what we  

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call a tight shale. 
Shale is a very fine grained  

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rock. 
Most of our oil and gas in the  

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past was produced out of 
sandstone which is very porous  

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and easy to extract the material 
from, but the shale is very high  

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in hydrocarbon but it doesn't 
have any interconnected porosity  

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so there's no way to get it out. 
And they create that porosity by  

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the hydrofrac process. 
As soon as they get that pumped  

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up, they start injecting the 
sand and the fluids down there.  

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Basically what happens is sand 
goes out, goes into these cracks  

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and when they back the pressure 
off, shut down those  

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compressors, the sand stays out 
there and holds those cracks  

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open. 
You hear the term proppant used  

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every once and a while for 
hydrofrac sand and that's  

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exactly what it means. 
It props open those cracks.  

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Once they've let the pressure 
off, the controversial issue is  

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you get a lot of fluid that 
comes back out of here, there's  

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the big fluid ponds you can see 
over here, that will take on a  

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lot of formation water and some 
of the material that's pumped  

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down in before they can actually 
produce the gas.  

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So what makes a good hydrofrac 
sand?  

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Well, this is the kind of thing 
that they're looking for.  

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These grains are almost 
perfectly spherical.  

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Very round, well-rounded as we 
say.  

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Almost entirely pure quartz. 
Very few, some have a little bit  

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of iron staining on them but 
generally this stuff is almost  

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perfectly clean, fine, even 
sized.  

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There are some very tight 
specifications in terms of size  

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gradation for different types of 
applications, but basically what  

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they want is this good clean, 
pure, very round quartz so it  

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won't hang up going out there 
into the cracks and the other  

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thing is it has to have a very 
high compressive strength  

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because when the pressure is 
left off and those pores tend to  

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close up, they'll crush a grain 
that isn't high compressive  

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strength.  

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So here is what an ideal frac 
well would look like.  

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It has a surface up here, maybe 
go down probably in this case  

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6,000 to 8,000 feet where 
they're doing the fracking.  

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In many bases it's down to 
15,000 feet or more.  

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Why? 
That's one of the reason they  

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need the high compressive 
strength.  

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The problems that have developed 
with hydrofracking, we've heard  

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a lot of it in the news about 
contamination of surface  

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aquifers, you see this little 
insert here shows the well head,  

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and basically, key to the hole 
thing, and you can imagine if  

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you're going to pump up a lot of 
pressure in here, you've got to  

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have that well very well 
constructed.  

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It's got to have a good casing 
and it's got to be well cemented  

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in. 
You can't have a problem.  

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You know what happens when you 
have a poor cement job, you get  

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a blow out like the well in the 
Gulf of Mexico last year, and  

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you can also get cases where 
this stuff leaks up around the  

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casing and can contaminate some 
water aquifers.  

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Chances are from the very deep 
depths you're not going to be  

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fracking all the way up to where 
you're going to actually  

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encounter that aquifer formation 
near the surface, but the chance  

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of well failure is a lot 
greater.  

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So it's a very important part of 
the whole thing is to make sure  

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that these wells are constructed 
properly.  

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So, where is the shale gas and 
oil?  

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Well, here is a map that was 
done by the Department of Energy  

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that basically shows you the 
regions in the US where we've  

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had or have these tight shales 
that are very rich in  

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hydrocarbon, usually natural gas 
but also oil as well.  

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There's a big basin out here in 
the Appalachians and this is the  

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area of the Marcellus shale and 
Utica shale.  

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There's a few other small ones 
in the east but the big ones are  

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like the Barnett down in Texas 
and Barnett and Woodford out in  

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west Texas and into New Mexico. 
The Bakken shale up in North  

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Dakota is a huge play, lots of 
formerly unrecoverable  

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hydrocarbons up here and a 
number of others out in the  

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Rocky Mountain basin. 
These are the areas where most  

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of this material gets used. 
To give you an idea just how big  

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this whole thing is, a colleague 
of mine from the DNR who is  

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their point man on frac sand 
sent this to me the other day,  

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and it's a satellite image. 
It's kind of neat.  

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You can see the aurora up here 
and everything.  

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Minneapolis, Minnesota, is over 
here.  

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You can see the towns along the 
highways.  

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This would be I94, Bismarck, 
this would be Fargo, probably  

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Winnipeg up here. 
You get this huge area of light  

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out here, light pollution 
basically.  

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That's all the lights from the 
oil and gas rigs in the Bakken  

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shale play. 
I've saw this thing and I  

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thought this is absolutely 
amazing.  

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Look at the size of that area. 
But I've had a couple friends  

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that I know who have traveled 
out there through North Dakota  

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this summer and they say it's 
just crazy.  

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There's trucks all over the 
place.  

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There's drill rigs. 
It's a huge venture that's going  

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on right now. 
Well, flip back out here at the  

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east, probably if you've watched 
any place in the news and heard  

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about problems with 
hydrofracking, it's out here in  

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what they call the Marcellus 
shale which is in the western  

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part of Pennsylvania, 
southwestern part of New York.  

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But I think you can see one 
thing that's very obvious on  

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here is that in some areas like 
in New York this stuff is  

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shallowing up to where the 
actual, these are contours on  

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the base of the Marcellus are up 
to around 3,000 feet.  

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When you're getting 3,000 feet 
and less, then you're getting  

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into the realm where I think you 
can possibly start getting some  

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problems from the actual 
fracking material or from the  

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hydrofracking itself relieving 
pressure by getting up into  

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formations that can be 
potentially water bearing.  

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So this is the areas that 
they've really had to take a  

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second look at it there's been a 
lot of study and is a lot of  

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study going on with the 
Department of Energy and EPA and  

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with the state geological 
surveys out east to see what  

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they can do about getting this 
better regulated because the  

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process, although it's a good 
one and we've been using it for,  

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as I say, a lot of years, it may 
not be exactly suitable  

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everywhere that we have the 
shale conditions that you can  

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recover oil from. 
It's not much of a problem when  

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you're out there in those big, 
deep basins, but it may be some  

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problems in areas like the east. 
Now here is another example.  

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This is from that Bakken shale 
out in North Dakota.  

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And you can see this is 
basically what happens.  

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They drill a whole series of 
these horizontal borings in the  

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petroleum bearing or gas bearing 
strata away from a single well  

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head, and then once they frac 
these things, they're on about a  

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1300-foot spacing, and they frac 
for a radius of about 500 feet  

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right around each bore hole 
here.  

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And that's enough to increase 
the porosity to get a whole lot  

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more recovered. 
The thing about this is this  

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isn't to scale. 
If you look over here, actually  

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you're looking at, this is 
10,000 feet down below the  

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surface that they're doing the 
fracking up there in North  

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Dakota. 
But this is basically how it's  

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done and what the process is all 
about.  

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So now let's get into the frac 
sand and where does it come from  

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and why are we here in Wisconsin 
looking for it.  

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Where is the best frac sand? 
Well, I wonder if you can guess  

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00:13:13,093 --> 00:13:15,428
what color I've used to show 
that.  

220
00:13:15,428 --> 00:13:17,997
[LAUGHTER] 
Basically, I took the  

221
00:13:17,997 --> 00:13:23,069
US geologic map, manipulated it 
a bit with an arc map, put the  

222
00:13:23,069 --> 00:13:26,706
Cambrian sandstone, it's a very 
mature, about 500-man-year-old  

223
00:13:26,706 --> 00:13:33,079
Cambrian age sandstone in red. 
Good deal up here in Wisconsin,  

224
00:13:33,079 --> 00:13:35,448
western Wisconsin, and over here 
into Minnesota, a little bit  

225
00:13:35,448 --> 00:13:38,251
down around the Ozarks and 
there's some scattered areas out  

226
00:13:38,251 --> 00:13:40,887
in the Appalachians, but 
basically a lot of these others  

227
00:13:40,887 --> 00:13:45,392
are not extensive or they're 
quartzitic, they're a little  

228
00:13:45,392 --> 00:13:47,560
tightly cemented and you can't 
really make good sand out of  

229
00:13:47,560 --> 00:13:51,231
them. 
The best of the stuff is right  

230
00:13:51,231 --> 00:13:55,468
here from Minnesota River Valley 
over through all of western  

231
00:13:55,468 --> 00:13:58,638
Wisconsin. 
This is what's gotten their  

232
00:13:58,638 --> 00:14:02,409
interest. 
So, again, the best stuff out  

233
00:14:02,409 --> 00:14:08,415
there is very pure quartz, very 
highly rounded, good, in this  

234
00:14:08,415 --> 00:14:17,524
case, very, these are nice, 
almost spherical grains.  

235
00:14:17,524 --> 00:14:20,360
This stuff is a little bit less 
rounded, probably from a younger  

236
00:14:20,360 --> 00:14:25,131
aged sand. 
Maybe a couple hundred man years  

237
00:14:25,131 --> 00:14:27,834
old Cretaceous age or something 
like that.  

238
00:14:27,834 --> 00:14:30,337
Generally doesn't have the level 
of maturity what we call, and it  

239
00:14:30,337 --> 00:14:34,374
also has possibly rack-rock 
fragments in it.  

240
00:14:34,374 --> 00:14:37,944
Glacial sand, we've got lots of 
in Wisconsin associated with  

241
00:14:37,944 --> 00:14:41,147
glacial deposits, is absolutely 
unsuitable to use for frac sand  

242
00:14:41,147 --> 00:14:43,616
because it's full of all kinds 
of stuff.  

243
00:14:43,616 --> 00:14:45,552
The grains are angular. 
There's all kinds of rock  

244
00:14:45,552 --> 00:14:47,887
fragments. 
There's all kinds of impurities  

245
00:14:47,887 --> 00:14:50,423
and materials in here that 
wouldn't hold the crushing  

246
00:14:50,423 --> 00:14:53,793
strength. 
It's not usable at all.  

247
00:14:53,793 --> 00:14:57,130
So basically the eastern half of 
the state, the glacial deposits,  

248
00:14:57,130 --> 00:14:59,766
I get asked every once in a 
while by counties over there,  

249
00:14:59,766 --> 00:15:02,268
are we going to have frac sand 
companies coming in to look  

250
00:15:02,268 --> 00:15:04,604
around. 
I say, nope, you're going to be  

251
00:15:04,604 --> 00:15:07,140
pretty safe. 
But the western part, there  

252
00:15:07,140 --> 00:15:11,678
you're in trouble. 
And this area of Minnesota is  

253
00:15:11,678 --> 00:15:15,482
less desirable than Wisconsin. 
I had a call from one of my  

254
00:15:15,482 --> 00:15:18,018
colleagues at the Minnesota 
Geological Survey not too long  

255
00:15:18,018 --> 00:15:20,420
ago, and he was asking what's 
all the deal over there in  

256
00:15:20,420 --> 00:15:23,556
Wisconsin, we're not really 
having all that much?  

257
00:15:23,556 --> 00:15:26,226
But there's two things: a couple 
of our major formations over  

258
00:15:26,226 --> 00:15:29,396
here in Wisconsin, which I'll 
talk about in a few minutes, are  

259
00:15:29,396 --> 00:15:32,699
buried a little too deeply over 
in Minnesota, and also the main  

260
00:15:32,699 --> 00:15:37,771
formations like the St. 
Peter and the Wonewoc are  

261
00:15:37,771 --> 00:15:41,975
covered by glacial deposits over 
here west of the river.  

262
00:15:41,975 --> 00:15:45,912
The advantage that we have in 
Wisconsin is that much of the  

263
00:15:45,912 --> 00:15:50,016
most desirable material is in 
what we call the driftless area,  

264
00:15:50,016 --> 00:15:53,019
or the area that the glaciers 
never actually covered.  

265
00:15:53,019 --> 00:15:55,321
So it's right there at the 
surface.  

266
00:15:55,321 --> 00:15:58,024
It's very easy to mine. 
You don't have to worry about a  

267
00:15:58,024 --> 00:15:59,592
lot of overburden.  

268
00:16:02,195 --> 00:16:07,300
So, here's the stratigraphic 
column in Wisconsin, aged to the  

269
00:16:07,300 --> 00:16:09,936
different rocks. 
We go from Precambrian rocks  

270
00:16:09,936 --> 00:16:13,206
down here at about three billion 
years all the way up to  

271
00:16:13,206 --> 00:16:16,176
Devonian, our youngest rocks, 
over in the Milwaukee area.  

272
00:16:16,176 --> 00:16:18,745
But our sands come from the 
lower part of the section down  

273
00:16:18,745 --> 00:16:21,748
here basically. 
Mostly in the Cambrian, there's  

274
00:16:21,748 --> 00:16:26,319
the Wonewoc sandstone, which is 
a good, very pure quartz  

275
00:16:26,319 --> 00:16:31,024
sandstone and the Jordan 
sandstone, and the Jordan  

276
00:16:31,024 --> 00:16:33,760
sandstone at the top of the 
Cambrian, which is just under  

277
00:16:33,760 --> 00:16:36,229
the Prairie du Chien limestone. 
And then we have the St.  

278
00:16:36,229 --> 00:16:38,431
Peter sandstone, which is 
slightly younger and occurs  

279
00:16:38,431 --> 00:16:43,737
throughout much of southern 
Wisconsin and southwestern  

280
00:16:43,737 --> 00:16:47,073
Wisconsin, but we're also seeing 
a little bit of interest grow in  

281
00:16:47,073 --> 00:16:50,010
the Mt. Simon 
sandstone, which is at the  

282
00:16:50,010 --> 00:16:53,046
very base of the section. 
And this is also a very mature  

283
00:16:53,046 --> 00:16:56,216
sandstone. 
Why are these such good, pure  

284
00:16:56,216 --> 00:16:59,552
sandstones? 
Basically, there was a huge,  

285
00:16:59,552 --> 00:17:04,190
long period of weathering that 
occurred on the continent after  

286
00:17:04,190 --> 00:17:08,762
the end of Precambrian time from 
about a billion years ago to  

287
00:17:08,762 --> 00:17:11,865
around 500 million years when 
the continent was flooded and  

288
00:17:11,865 --> 00:17:14,434
the Cambrian sands were 
deposited.  

289
00:17:14,434 --> 00:17:16,736
And there was no vegetation 
around at the time, very intense  

290
00:17:16,736 --> 00:17:20,140
weathering, this stuff got 
kicked around, blown around,  

291
00:17:20,140 --> 00:17:23,243
washed around by streams. 
Most of the unstable rock  

292
00:17:23,243 --> 00:17:27,113
fragments, unstable minerals all 
were destroyed in the time and  

293
00:17:27,113 --> 00:17:30,016
you were left with nothing but 
the most durable stuff which is  

294
00:17:30,016 --> 00:17:32,919
good, pure quartz and it was 
nicely rounded.  

295
00:17:32,919 --> 00:17:38,258
So that's the stuff that got 
incorporated into the Cambrian  

296
00:17:38,258 --> 00:17:41,461
sands, and that's the stuff that 
we've even got a little bit of  

297
00:17:41,461 --> 00:17:44,097
it as late at the St. Peter. 
But that's what the sand  

298
00:17:44,097 --> 00:17:48,168
industry is interested in. 
So let's start up in the north,  

299
00:17:48,168 --> 00:17:51,171
and I'll show you a little bit 
of what we're looking at.  

300
00:17:51,171 --> 00:17:55,408
This is in Barron County in 
northwestern Wisconsin.  

301
00:17:55,408 --> 00:17:59,946
The Jordan sandstone is shown in 
here in an orange color.  

302
00:17:59,946 --> 00:18:03,083
Up in this area and in the 
northern part of Chippewa County  

303
00:18:03,083 --> 00:18:07,253
where we've had probably 10 or 
15 different operations try to  

304
00:18:07,253 --> 00:18:12,192
locate in the last year, half a 
dozen or more in Barron County,  

305
00:18:12,192 --> 00:18:14,694
they're interested in mining 
this Jordan sandstone because  

306
00:18:14,694 --> 00:18:18,598
it's very coarse, it will meet 
what's called the 20/40 size  

307
00:18:18,598 --> 00:18:21,801
gradation which is about the 
coarsest of the frac sands, and  

308
00:18:21,801 --> 00:18:24,771
it's exposed right near the 
surface.  

309
00:18:24,771 --> 00:18:27,807
Even though this area is 
glaciated, there is a lot of  

310
00:18:27,807 --> 00:18:31,544
exposure near the surface, and 
you don't have a cap over the  

311
00:18:31,544 --> 00:18:34,147
top of the Prairie du Chien 
limestone which is shown over  

312
00:18:34,147 --> 00:18:37,917
here in the blue color. 
So there's quite a bit of  

313
00:18:37,917 --> 00:18:41,421
interest in development up here. 
One of the keys which I'll talk  

314
00:18:41,421 --> 00:18:45,725
about quite a bit during the 
talk is transportation.  

315
00:18:45,725 --> 00:18:47,827
This is a rail line coming down 
here.  

316
00:18:47,827 --> 00:18:50,230
I don't know that it's complete 
all the way to Chippewa Falls  

317
00:18:50,230 --> 00:18:52,332
anymore. 
They may have abandoned some of  

318
00:18:52,332 --> 00:18:54,968
it. 
This section that has been  

319
00:18:54,968 --> 00:18:57,737
abandoned out here west of 
Cameron and Barron, the DOT is  

320
00:18:57,737 --> 00:19:01,007
actually talking about funding 
rebuilding that track out as far  

321
00:19:01,007 --> 00:19:05,979
as Almena just to serve about 
three or four major sand mines  

322
00:19:05,979 --> 00:19:09,983
that are going in out in the 
western part of Barron County.  

323
00:19:09,983 --> 00:19:13,753
So, let's take a look. 
The geology in pre-boom  

324
00:19:13,753 --> 00:19:17,023
production sites in west central 
Wisconsin looks something like  

325
00:19:17,023 --> 00:19:19,659
this. 
This is a map that I worked on  

326
00:19:19,659 --> 00:19:23,697
back in the 1980s. 
We had, up until a couple years  

327
00:19:23,697 --> 00:19:28,034
ago, only three or four 
operations out there.  

328
00:19:28,034 --> 00:19:31,471
We had two old mines over here 
along the river at Maiden Rock  

329
00:19:31,471 --> 00:19:34,874
and at Bay City in Pierce 
County.  

330
00:19:34,874 --> 00:19:37,544
And these were mines that mined 
the Jordan formation  

331
00:19:37,544 --> 00:19:40,246
underground. 
They actually went in through a  

332
00:19:40,246 --> 00:19:43,383
tunnel driven into the side of 
the bluff along the Mississippi  

333
00:19:43,383 --> 00:19:46,720
River and mined the material out 
underground by what we called  

334
00:19:46,720 --> 00:19:50,223
room and pillar method. 
And that way they could just get  

335
00:19:50,223 --> 00:19:56,196
the very desirable, very coarse 
member of the Jordan.  

336
00:19:56,196 --> 00:20:01,735
Other areas we had up in the 
north, Fairmount Minerals who  

337
00:20:01,735 --> 00:20:05,238
came in and bought out these two 
old mines down here, started a  

338
00:20:05,238 --> 00:20:09,442
new plant a year or two ago, or 
probably three or four years  

339
00:20:09,442 --> 00:20:12,112
now, up in Menomonie. 
And they're in this other  

340
00:20:12,112 --> 00:20:14,247
formation shown in red which is 
called the Wonewoc.  

341
00:20:14,247 --> 00:20:18,051
This is the Wonewoc formation in 
red.  

342
00:20:18,051 --> 00:20:20,520
The Jordan that I pointed out is 
in the gold color.  

343
00:20:20,520 --> 00:20:23,656
If you notice, there's not as 
much area of Jordan.  

344
00:20:23,656 --> 00:20:26,359
That's because it's a steep 
cliff former and forms long in  

345
00:20:26,359 --> 00:20:29,362
the bluffs or on the steep sides 
of valleys and it's very  

346
00:20:29,362 --> 00:20:33,166
inaccessible except to go in 
underground.  

347
00:20:33,166 --> 00:20:36,670
Whereas, a lot of surface 
exposure of the Wonewoc and  

348
00:20:36,670 --> 00:20:40,273
that's the target a lot of the 
companies are looking at.  

349
00:20:40,273 --> 00:20:42,942
Badger Mining Company, which has 
been in business for Wisconsin  

350
00:20:42,942 --> 00:20:47,313
for years and years, has a large 
mine over at Taylor in Jackson  

351
00:20:47,313 --> 00:20:49,849
County. 
And this one has been there for  

352
00:20:49,849 --> 00:20:54,220
about 30 years, and it produces 
a lot of frac sand plus foundry  

353
00:20:54,220 --> 00:20:57,824
sand and various other 
industrial sand products.  

354
00:20:57,824 --> 00:21:02,529
But that was where we were 
probably five years ago.  

355
00:21:02,529 --> 00:21:04,898
But this gives you an idea of 
what the geology is out in the  

356
00:21:04,898 --> 00:21:07,367
area that they're basically 
looking.  

357
00:21:07,367 --> 00:21:11,905
The Mt. Simon sandstone 
is shown in the  

358
00:21:11,905 --> 00:21:14,808
light tan color, and we're 
seeing a lot of interest in that  

359
00:21:14,808 --> 00:21:18,144
down in the area around Tomah 
and Black River Falls where this  

360
00:21:18,144 --> 00:21:23,850
material has been very heavily 
weathered and it's in part  

361
00:21:23,850 --> 00:21:27,120
alluvial material as well as a 
bedrock material and it's being  

362
00:21:27,120 --> 00:21:32,525
exploited as a waste product 
from cranberry bog development.  

363
00:21:32,525 --> 00:21:36,062
It's being bought up by the frac 
sand miners.  

364
00:21:36,062 --> 00:21:38,064
But basically most of the new 
mines that you hear about are  

365
00:21:38,064 --> 00:21:40,700
going in areas like Buffalo and 
Trempealeau County are in this  

366
00:21:40,700 --> 00:21:44,771
Wonewoc. 
Here's a little closer look at  

367
00:21:44,771 --> 00:21:47,774
it. 
Badger in Taylor.  

368
00:21:47,774 --> 00:21:51,511
There's now a brand new mine 
called Winn Bay Sands put in by  

369
00:21:51,511 --> 00:21:54,914
a Canadian company down here at 
Blair in Trempealeau County.  

370
00:21:54,914 --> 00:21:58,852
The one good advantage that 
these two operations have is  

371
00:21:58,852 --> 00:22:01,421
they're located on what was the 
old Green Bay and western  

372
00:22:01,421 --> 00:22:05,925
railroad route which goes down 
and connects with the northern  

373
00:22:05,925 --> 00:22:08,261
Santa Fe along the Mississippi. 
So they do have rail shipping  

374
00:22:08,261 --> 00:22:11,898
access. 
That's a very important thing as  

375
00:22:11,898 --> 00:22:14,300
far as moving a bulk commodity 
like this.  

376
00:22:14,300 --> 00:22:18,972
What's Wonewoc sandstone look 
like?  

377
00:22:18,972 --> 00:22:21,307
It's fairly impressive and 
outcrops many places.  

378
00:22:21,307 --> 00:22:26,546
If you've driven down, this is 
highway 14, junction with 35  

379
00:22:26,546 --> 00:22:31,418
right south of La Crosse. 
That corner, this is all Wonewoc  

380
00:22:31,418 --> 00:22:35,321
in this section. 
It's a very pure, if you go up  

381
00:22:35,321 --> 00:22:38,158
and pick out a handful of it or 
break some of it as you can in  

382
00:22:38,158 --> 00:22:44,230
this road cut which is just to 
the east on I90 over near west  

383
00:22:44,230 --> 00:22:48,535
Salem, you can just pick this 
stuff up and break it up.  

384
00:22:48,535 --> 00:22:51,104
It's friable enough that you can 
break it up with your hand, and  

385
00:22:51,104 --> 00:22:53,740
it looks like just little tiny 
marbles if you look at it  

386
00:22:53,740 --> 00:22:56,743
through a hand lens. 
But this is what the Wonewoc  

387
00:22:56,743 --> 00:22:59,612
looks like. 
It's capped over on top by what  

388
00:22:59,612 --> 00:23:02,182
we call the a tunnel city 
formation which is a very fine  

389
00:23:02,182 --> 00:23:07,120
grained what we call glauconitic 
sandstone.  

390
00:23:07,120 --> 00:23:09,622
Has a lot of phosphatic material 
in it.  

391
00:23:09,622 --> 00:23:12,525
This material actually is a very 
good material if you don't have  

392
00:23:12,525 --> 00:23:15,095
too much of it to give you 
problems.  

393
00:23:15,095 --> 00:23:19,232
It's overburden is very good to 
use in your reclamation of a  

394
00:23:19,232 --> 00:23:22,902
mine that you're trying to take 
out the Wonewoc.  

395
00:23:24,104 --> 00:23:26,706
One of the best examples of a 
mine of the Wonewoc is the  

396
00:23:26,706 --> 00:23:29,309
Badger operation in Taylor 
which, as I said, has been in  

397
00:23:29,309 --> 00:23:31,644
business for many years. 
This is an old photo.  

398
00:23:31,644 --> 00:23:34,047
If you take a look at it today, 
there's about twice as many  

399
00:23:34,047 --> 00:23:36,916
buildings in here. 
One thing this operation has  

400
00:23:36,916 --> 00:23:39,252
done, it's been here for many, 
many years, it's won many awards  

401
00:23:39,252 --> 00:23:42,455
for reclamation, they've done a 
very good job of restoring the  

402
00:23:42,455 --> 00:23:46,393
site. 
What they basically do in their  

403
00:23:46,393 --> 00:23:50,764
mining operation is they wash 
this stuff down in a sump.  

404
00:23:50,764 --> 00:23:55,035
They basically will bulldoze it 
or rip it because it's very  

405
00:23:55,035 --> 00:23:57,570
soft. 
They don't have to blast much on  

406
00:23:57,570 --> 00:24:00,273
it. 
Wash it down into a sump, pump  

407
00:24:00,273 --> 00:24:03,243
it up in a slurry to the top of 
a tower like this where it goes  

408
00:24:03,243 --> 00:24:06,680
through a process of washing 
through different screens and  

409
00:24:06,680 --> 00:24:10,784
sieves and then it's dewatered 
in a series of a cyclone  

410
00:24:10,784 --> 00:24:13,787
dewaterers down at the bottom 
and that's how they sort and  

411
00:24:13,787 --> 00:24:19,526
classify the sand. 
The Jordan sandstone is another  

412
00:24:19,526 --> 00:24:21,861
important formation out in 
western Wisconsin.  

413
00:24:21,861 --> 00:24:24,330
A little bit younger than the 
Wonewoc.  

414
00:24:24,330 --> 00:24:27,901
This is the Jordan right below 
the Prairie du Chien limestone.  

415
00:24:27,901 --> 00:24:30,670
This is in a cut south of the 
town of Arcadia over in  

416
00:24:30,670 --> 00:24:35,608
Trempealeau County. 
Jordan is a very good material,  

417
00:24:35,608 --> 00:24:39,646
has the coarsest sand in it, 
highly desirable but you can  

418
00:24:39,646 --> 00:24:43,817
have generally a good cap of 
limestone on top that, unless  

419
00:24:43,817 --> 00:24:48,321
that's been quarried away as it 
has part way in this case, you  

420
00:24:48,321 --> 00:24:50,957
have a hard time getting at that 
material unless you go in from  

421
00:24:50,957 --> 00:24:54,661
an underground. 
And a lot of the sand companies  

422
00:24:54,661 --> 00:24:57,731
are very, very leery of dealing 
with underground mining even  

423
00:24:57,731 --> 00:25:00,200
though we've had a couple 
successful operations for 40  

424
00:25:00,200 --> 00:25:03,670
years over in Pierce County. 
Problems you can get into in  

425
00:25:03,670 --> 00:25:06,673
there. 
You can get cement.  

426
00:25:06,673 --> 00:25:09,709
This is a silica cemented area 
within that.  

427
00:25:09,709 --> 00:25:12,812
That's just as hard as the 
quartz site up at Baraboo.  

428
00:25:12,812 --> 00:25:16,182
And if you run into this kind of 
material in a sand mine, this is  

429
00:25:16,182 --> 00:25:21,988
going to give you no end of 
grief.  

430
00:25:21,988 --> 00:25:24,591
And I'm very surprised that a 
lot of companies that I'm aware  

431
00:25:24,591 --> 00:25:27,127
of that have come in and started 
looking and prospecting for sand  

432
00:25:27,127 --> 00:25:30,196
in western Wisconsin, you'll ask 
them and they haven't done much  

433
00:25:30,196 --> 00:25:33,566
drilling, they haven't done much 
evaluation work.  

434
00:25:33,566 --> 00:25:36,903
They've just gone in here, look 
for unzoned town, basically,  

435
00:25:36,903 --> 00:25:39,205
where they don't have to go 
through a lot of hassle, bought  

436
00:25:39,205 --> 00:25:43,376
up property and gone to the 
county to get their reclamation  

437
00:25:43,376 --> 00:25:47,480
permit which is required under 
law, and otherwise started out  

438
00:25:47,480 --> 00:25:51,818
and are digging sand and hauling 
it down to Minnesota or wherever  

439
00:25:51,818 --> 00:25:56,022
they've got a rail connection 
and mining it without really  

440
00:25:56,022 --> 00:25:58,525
thinking too much about that. 
And I think we're going to have  

441
00:25:58,525 --> 00:26:01,194
some in for a surprise one of 
these days.  

442
00:26:01,194 --> 00:26:03,663
This is the underground mine in 
the Jordan over at Maiden Rock  

443
00:26:03,663 --> 00:26:09,402
in Pierce County. 
The old mine at Bay City, which  

444
00:26:09,402 --> 00:26:12,505
was recently reopened, was 
closed for a while and  

445
00:26:12,505 --> 00:26:15,775
abandoned, and what they did 
basically was put in a culvert  

446
00:26:15,775 --> 00:26:19,045
pipe with grading on there, and 
bats love to go in and hibernate  

447
00:26:19,045 --> 00:26:22,415
in these things. 
And the bats are in here in the  

448
00:26:22,415 --> 00:26:25,251
active mine down at Maiden Rock 
at the time.  

449
00:26:25,251 --> 00:26:28,154
They go back off into corners 
that no one, where there's not  

450
00:26:28,154 --> 00:26:30,290
much operation. 
It doesn't seem to bother them a  

451
00:26:30,290 --> 00:26:32,726
bit. 
But basically the entire  

452
00:26:32,726 --> 00:26:35,261
operation is carried on 
underground in here, in terms of  

453
00:26:35,261 --> 00:26:39,165
the wet sieving process 
classification.  

454
00:26:39,165 --> 00:26:43,370
It's pumped out in a series of 
pipes to the dry plant which is  

455
00:26:43,370 --> 00:26:47,307
a drying kiln located right out 
here.  

456
00:26:47,307 --> 00:26:50,443
To add it back into the mine is 
right back in here.  

457
00:26:50,443 --> 00:26:53,413
If you go down, especially to 
this place again today, you'll  

458
00:26:53,413 --> 00:26:55,648
see there's all kind of 
buildings around.  

459
00:26:55,648 --> 00:26:57,951
It's expanded considerably since 
the boom started.  

460
00:26:57,951 --> 00:27:00,520
But it's dried in this area in a 
kiln.  

461
00:27:00,520 --> 00:27:02,889
And there's a conveyor system 
that takes it right under  

462
00:27:02,889 --> 00:27:05,091
highway 35 where they can load 
directly on to the northern  

463
00:27:05,091 --> 00:27:08,428
Santa Fe. 
So sand producing areas in  

464
00:27:08,428 --> 00:27:11,164
western counties, let's just 
kind of sum this up.  

465
00:27:11,164 --> 00:27:13,299
We've got Bay City and Maiden 
Rock, two old underground mines  

466
00:27:13,299 --> 00:27:16,002
over here. 
One up in Menomonie.  

467
00:27:16,002 --> 00:27:20,907
Taylor and the Wonewoc down at 
Jackson County.  

468
00:27:20,907 --> 00:27:24,010
We also have a big mine located 
up near where the power plant is  

469
00:27:24,010 --> 00:27:26,646
just south of Portage. 
It's owned by the Unimin  

470
00:27:26,646 --> 00:27:30,083
Corporation. 
Portage and the Menomonie mines  

471
00:27:30,083 --> 00:27:33,987
both are in Wonewoc, and the 
Wonewoc has a little more finer  

472
00:27:33,987 --> 00:27:38,124
material in it but it's also 
very pure quartz.  

473
00:27:38,124 --> 00:27:41,895
So they've been able, in both of 
these mines, to partner with  

474
00:27:41,895 --> 00:27:45,732
Cardinal Glass Company, which is 
a major glass producer, has a  

475
00:27:45,732 --> 00:27:49,235
plant in Portage and also one up 
in Menomonie, the material they  

476
00:27:49,235 --> 00:27:53,273
can't use for hydrofrac sand, 
they can sell to the glass  

477
00:27:53,273 --> 00:27:55,742
company. 
It's used as a basis for making  

478
00:27:55,742 --> 00:27:56,876
glass.  

479
00:28:02,682 --> 00:28:04,851
The other formation that's 
starting to show a little bit of  

480
00:28:04,851 --> 00:28:07,053
interest is the Mt. Simon 
sandstone.  

481
00:28:07,053 --> 00:28:09,356
And I'm a little bit surprised 
at this.  

482
00:28:09,356 --> 00:28:12,025
This is the base of Mt. 
Simon right here, resting on the  

483
00:28:12,025 --> 00:28:15,095
Precambrian, which is weathered 
granite, up at Chippewa Falls.  

484
00:28:15,095 --> 00:28:18,365
Much of the lower part of Mt. 
Simon is full the clay streaks,  

485
00:28:18,365 --> 00:28:22,302
it's got very pebbly material in 
it, but basically is pure enough  

486
00:28:22,302 --> 00:28:25,271
quartz that they can sort this 
stuff out by the sieving process  

487
00:28:25,271 --> 00:28:28,842
and whatever and concentrated 
material that they can use for  

488
00:28:28,842 --> 00:28:33,146
sand. 
And once you get farther beyond  

489
00:28:33,146 --> 00:28:36,383
the edge of the outcrop area of 
the Wonewoc, sort of up into  

490
00:28:36,383 --> 00:28:40,020
central Wisconsin, this is the 
formation that's available to  

491
00:28:40,020 --> 00:28:42,522
use. 
And when you hear about  

492
00:28:42,522 --> 00:28:45,658
operations up in Wood County and 
areas like that, northern Clark  

493
00:28:45,658 --> 00:28:48,028
County, they're in the 
Mt. Simon.  

494
00:28:50,263 --> 00:28:55,535
Another type of operation that 
we're seeing and started a  

495
00:28:55,535 --> 00:28:58,104
couple years ago, basically this 
is a processing plant over in  

496
00:28:58,104 --> 00:29:01,207
the Tomah area, and you can see 
these if you drive up highway 94  

497
00:29:01,207 --> 00:29:04,411
and you look north, about 
Oakdale and that area, you'll  

498
00:29:04,411 --> 00:29:08,982
see these great big piles of 
sand, big piles of white sand.  

499
00:29:08,982 --> 00:29:14,054
And a lot of this stuff is 
actually from waste material  

500
00:29:14,054 --> 00:29:17,857
produced by cranberry growers. 
As they're expanding their  

501
00:29:17,857 --> 00:29:20,827
cranberry bogs and they're 
excavating out these big ponds  

502
00:29:20,827 --> 00:29:23,797
for water storage, they're 
coming up with a lot of sand.  

503
00:29:23,797 --> 00:29:27,100
Well, a smart entrepreneur from 
Texas came up here from a  

504
00:29:27,100 --> 00:29:30,337
company called Proppant 
Specialists, and he decided I  

505
00:29:30,337 --> 00:29:35,141
could go in and buy this sand, I 
wouldn't have to mine it so I  

506
00:29:35,141 --> 00:29:37,577
wouldn't have to worry about 
getting any kind of permits to  

507
00:29:37,577 --> 00:29:42,349
mine, I wouldn't have to deal 
with mine safety and MSHA, and I  

508
00:29:42,349 --> 00:29:45,318
wouldn't even have to get a NR 
135 reclamation permit because  

509
00:29:45,318 --> 00:29:47,754
I'm just buying agricultural 
waste here.  

510
00:29:47,754 --> 00:29:51,458
And so he set up a plant and 
actually all the major producers  

511
00:29:51,458 --> 00:29:53,927
in the state at the time hated 
him for it but it's a pretty  

512
00:29:53,927 --> 00:29:56,463
good business plan. 
It's kind of clever.  

513
00:29:56,463 --> 00:29:59,532
They still are producing a lot 
of sand out of this.  

514
00:29:59,532 --> 00:30:02,369
And this is in part alluvial 
material and it's in part  

515
00:30:02,369 --> 00:30:05,472
bedrock material. 
It would be Mt. Simon  

516
00:30:05,472 --> 00:30:08,808
bedrock in this area, but 
if you look around some of the  

517
00:30:08,808 --> 00:30:11,945
high hills in there, like the 
bluffs you see up at Camp  

518
00:30:11,945 --> 00:30:15,849
Douglas area and around there, 
these are big bluffs of  

519
00:30:15,849 --> 00:30:20,153
Galesville or Wonewoc sandstone, 
and they're sitting out there on  

520
00:30:20,153 --> 00:30:22,822
a plain of Mt. Simon, 
and this stuff was all  

521
00:30:22,822 --> 00:30:26,526
reworked and weathered during 
the glacial times when that area  

522
00:30:26,526 --> 00:30:29,195
was filled with Glacial Lake 
Wisconsin.  

523
00:30:29,195 --> 00:30:32,098
And Glacial Lake Wisconsin on 
the eastern side, the sands over  

524
00:30:32,098 --> 00:30:35,869
in, say, Portage, Adams County, 
that area, are all full of  

525
00:30:35,869 --> 00:30:38,738
glacial material and not 
suitable, but since this stuff  

526
00:30:38,738 --> 00:30:42,509
is all locally derived and is 
right there and is already very  

527
00:30:42,509 --> 00:30:47,814
much disaggregated soft 
material, it's a natural for  

528
00:30:47,814 --> 00:30:51,484
development. 
And we've had probably about  

529
00:30:51,484 --> 00:30:56,823
five or six companies come in 
looking at developing sand mines  

530
00:30:56,823 --> 00:31:01,127
and plants within using this 
type of material in particularly  

531
00:31:01,127 --> 00:31:06,132
the area of Monroe County. 
So let's take a look at the  

532
00:31:06,132 --> 00:31:09,235
St. Peter sandstone. 
This is the youngest of the  

533
00:31:09,235 --> 00:31:11,504
bunch. 
The St. Peter in our area  

534
00:31:11,504 --> 00:31:14,074
up here is a 
little bit finer grain than it  

535
00:31:14,074 --> 00:31:16,643
is in areas like down in 
Illinois.  

536
00:31:16,643 --> 00:31:19,813
It hasn't really received much 
interest as far as being used  

537
00:31:19,813 --> 00:31:23,249
for frac sand. 
The big production areas are  

538
00:31:23,249 --> 00:31:28,054
over here in Green Lake County. 
There used to be several old  

539
00:31:28,054 --> 00:31:31,424
abandoned operations. 
There's a big one, Badger's  

540
00:31:31,424 --> 00:31:35,662
Fairwater plant over here at a 
place called Utley near  

541
00:31:35,662 --> 00:31:39,132
Fairwater on the border with 
Fond du Lac County.  

542
00:31:39,132 --> 00:31:43,870
There's Gelhar Company has a 
mine at Markesan.  

543
00:31:43,870 --> 00:31:49,009
There's a number of old 
abandoned foundry sand  

544
00:31:49,009 --> 00:31:52,012
operations west of New Glarus 
and down near Hanover in Rock  

545
00:31:52,012 --> 00:31:56,616
County.  

546
00:32:00,820 --> 00:32:03,490
Out here west of Madison and 
Dane County, there was a large  

547
00:32:03,490 --> 00:32:07,027
foundry sand mine out there. 
But a lot of St. Peter  

548
00:32:07,027 --> 00:32:09,863
is exposed down here in 
the southern part of the state.  

549
00:32:09,863 --> 00:32:12,866
In general, the interest in St. 
Peter has been, as I say, for a  

550
00:32:12,866 --> 00:32:15,902
foundry sand because it's not 
coarse enough grain and it  

551
00:32:15,902 --> 00:32:19,539
doesn't have quite as much 
compressive strength as the  

552
00:32:19,539 --> 00:32:23,576
Cambrian sands so it's not as 
suitable for a frac sand, but  

553
00:32:23,576 --> 00:32:29,616
they're having, right now, a 
shortage of foundry sands  

554
00:32:29,616 --> 00:32:32,419
because many of the producers in 
other areas that could convert  

555
00:32:32,419 --> 00:32:35,288
over to producing frac sand 
because the market has been so  

556
00:32:35,288 --> 00:32:37,824
hot in the last year have given 
up on production of foundry  

557
00:32:37,824 --> 00:32:41,561
sand. 
So we're really getting a lot of  

558
00:32:41,561 --> 00:32:44,798
demand for foundry sand over in 
this part of the state.  

559
00:32:44,798 --> 00:32:47,701
A number of companies are 
looking at expanding their  

560
00:32:47,701 --> 00:32:50,170
resources. 
And you wonder, well, with a  

561
00:32:50,170 --> 00:32:53,440
down economy, why is there such 
a big deal for foundry sand?  

562
00:32:53,440 --> 00:32:56,743
We're the manhole cover capitol 
of the world here in Wisconsin.  

563
00:32:56,743 --> 00:32:59,879
You see all the Nina Foundry and 
Brillion Iron Works out there on  

564
00:32:59,879 --> 00:33:04,384
every manhole and drain out 
there in the streets.  

565
00:33:04,384 --> 00:33:10,023
But basically one of the company 
people was telling me that  

566
00:33:10,023 --> 00:33:13,727
companies like Oshkosh Truck 
that have gotten these big  

567
00:33:13,727 --> 00:33:16,229
multimillion dollar contracts 
from the government to produce  

568
00:33:16,229 --> 00:33:18,965
armored vehicles and such for 
the military are using a lot of  

569
00:33:18,965 --> 00:33:22,168
castings, and that's one of the 
sources that there's a shortage  

570
00:33:22,168 --> 00:33:26,439
of actual good foundry sand on 
the market right now.  

571
00:33:29,743 --> 00:33:32,212
So St. Peter, 
this is what St. Peter  

572
00:33:32,212 --> 00:33:34,447
basically looks like. 
Down in Iowa County you can see  

573
00:33:34,447 --> 00:33:36,549
these big bluffs in a lot of 
places.  

574
00:33:36,549 --> 00:33:39,586
Down south of Madison it's 
believed that it was actually a  

575
00:33:39,586 --> 00:33:43,523
dune sand. 
Aeolian origin in some areas in  

576
00:33:43,523 --> 00:33:46,993
here. 
You'll see these very big broad  

577
00:33:46,993 --> 00:33:49,396
cross beds. 
Generally, the St. Peter  

578
00:33:49,396 --> 00:33:52,465
is a very soft material. 
You can walk up to an outcrop,  

579
00:33:52,465 --> 00:33:56,436
pull it out. 
It's frosted very, it looks like  

580
00:33:56,436 --> 00:33:59,272
sugar when you pick it up. 
Very fine grained and very  

581
00:33:59,272 --> 00:34:02,742
rounded. 
But it doesn't quite have the  

582
00:34:02,742 --> 00:34:05,278
characteristics for frac sand 
that the old Cambrian sandstones  

583
00:34:05,278 --> 00:34:08,081
do. 
One of our bigger operations of  

584
00:34:08,081 --> 00:34:11,017
the St. Peter 
is up at the Badger  

585
00:34:11,017 --> 00:34:14,421
Fairwater plant. 
Basically, there they're doing  

586
00:34:14,421 --> 00:34:19,225
entirely hydraulic mining. 
They basically push sand or  

587
00:34:19,225 --> 00:34:22,862
disaggregated St. Peter 
sandstone down into a sump  

588
00:34:22,862 --> 00:34:26,299
and suck it up the same way as 
they do over at Taylor, pump  

589
00:34:26,299 --> 00:34:29,636
that up to a plant where it goes 
through and is processed and  

590
00:34:29,636 --> 00:34:33,473
then put into stockpiles and 
shipped for delivery primarily  

591
00:34:33,473 --> 00:34:37,911
to the foundry industry. 
St. Peter  

592
00:34:37,911 --> 00:34:40,413
is a very difficult 
formation to work, whereas over  

593
00:34:40,413 --> 00:34:43,783
in the west, the Jordan and the 
Wonewoc are fairly uniform  

594
00:34:43,783 --> 00:34:46,586
thickness. 
The St. Peter  

595
00:34:46,586 --> 00:34:49,255
can go, it was formed in 
channels that were cut into the  

596
00:34:49,255 --> 00:34:53,193
underlying Prairie du Chien 
limestone, and it can actually  

597
00:34:53,193 --> 00:34:57,731
vary from nothing here in this 
quarry down at Markesan in  

598
00:34:57,731 --> 00:35:00,934
southern Green Lake County. 
This is a Prairie du Chien  

599
00:35:00,934 --> 00:35:03,970
formation down here. 
Platteville formation above.  

600
00:35:03,970 --> 00:35:08,842
That little rusty sort of line 
horizon in there is St. Peter.  

601
00:35:08,842 --> 00:35:15,482
Five miles north of there this 
is the AF Gelhar Sand plant and  

602
00:35:15,482 --> 00:35:21,187
mine just north of Markesan, and 
he has over 200 feet of material  

603
00:35:21,187 --> 00:35:25,158
here that he's mining for 
foundry sand.  

604
00:35:25,158 --> 00:35:28,194
Once you get down to the base of 
the St. Peter,  

605
00:35:28,194 --> 00:35:30,397
it's pretty easy to tell 
when you're running out of it  

606
00:35:30,397 --> 00:35:33,400
because you get into a very red 
shale which is just reworked  

607
00:35:33,400 --> 00:35:38,071
material from that weathering 
surface on the top of the  

608
00:35:38,071 --> 00:35:43,176
Prairie du Chien before the St. 
Peter was actually deposited.  

609
00:35:43,176 --> 00:35:47,414
So, what are the prospects for 
sand mining in south western  

610
00:35:47,414 --> 00:35:51,017
Wisconsin? 
Right now I'm getting ready for  

611
00:35:51,017 --> 00:35:54,587
Friday. 
I'm going down for a meeting  

612
00:35:54,587 --> 00:35:56,990
with the Lower Wisconsin 
Riverway Commission is having a  

613
00:35:56,990 --> 00:36:00,360
meeting down in Spring Green in 
which we're going to talk about  

614
00:36:00,360 --> 00:36:03,496
potential for sand development 
down here in the lower Wisconsin  

615
00:36:03,496 --> 00:36:09,369
valley. 
The Jordan is exposed in a lot  

616
00:36:09,369 --> 00:36:14,908
of the bluffs along these 
valleys by Boscobel, areas stuff  

617
00:36:14,908 --> 00:36:17,444
as that. 
St. Peter is shown in that dark  

618
00:36:17,444 --> 00:36:22,315
green color, potential is still 
down there.  

619
00:36:22,315 --> 00:36:24,984
One good thing about it, they 
have the service of that  

620
00:36:24,984 --> 00:36:29,856
Wisconsin central line that goes 
west of Madison down to bridge  

621
00:36:29,856 --> 00:36:33,560
port along the river, and this 
has been a key to getting people  

622
00:36:33,560 --> 00:36:37,897
thinking about development. 
There's other issues down here  

623
00:36:37,897 --> 00:36:41,134
in terms of preserving the 
riverway and various aesthetic  

624
00:36:41,134 --> 00:36:45,839
issues, and I'm not sure just 
where this is going to go, but  

625
00:36:45,839 --> 00:36:48,808
there have been some serious 
inquiries from some companies as  

626
00:36:48,808 --> 00:36:52,312
to what the resources are down 
here and a number of landowners  

627
00:36:52,312 --> 00:36:55,148
have been approached. 
Much of the area of south  

628
00:36:55,148 --> 00:36:58,518
western Wisconsin, which exposes 
a lot of St. Peter  

629
00:36:58,518 --> 00:37:01,087
sandstone in many of the 
valleys down here in the  

630
00:37:01,087 --> 00:37:05,792
Kickapoo and Platte Rivers and 
various others, is not  

631
00:37:05,792 --> 00:37:13,833
accessible because the railroads 
basically ended in, used to have  

632
00:37:13,833 --> 00:37:16,169
rails through much of that area 
but it ends at Monroe at this  

633
00:37:16,169 --> 00:37:18,738
time. 
I wouldn't doubt that there  

634
00:37:18,738 --> 00:37:21,007
would be some interest in 
development, say, in Rock and  

635
00:37:21,007 --> 00:37:26,012
eastern Green County. 
Taking a closer look at Iowa  

636
00:37:26,012 --> 00:37:29,949
County. 
This is map recently completed.  

637
00:37:29,949 --> 00:37:34,287
There's Lone Rock, Spring Green. 
The Jordan outcrop is shown.  

638
00:37:34,287 --> 00:37:38,091
Everything else has been shown 
in the tan color here in the  

639
00:37:38,091 --> 00:37:41,161
rest of the formation. 
The Jordan outcrop area is shown  

640
00:37:41,161 --> 00:37:44,097
in that red color which 
indicates there's a lot of it  

641
00:37:44,097 --> 00:37:46,599
available up to down these 
valleys.  

642
00:37:46,599 --> 00:37:51,037
And once you get on top, the St. 
Peter is shown in the green.  

643
00:37:51,037 --> 00:37:54,074
So there's definitely potential 
resource down there.  

644
00:37:54,074 --> 00:37:57,510
So let's look at some of the 
issues that surround sand mining  

645
00:37:57,510 --> 00:38:01,014
today and just where we're going 
with it.  

646
00:38:01,014 --> 00:38:05,785
Some of the advantages that you 
can't ignore: local jobs and  

647
00:38:05,785 --> 00:38:09,389
economic growth. 
There's probably an average of  

648
00:38:09,389 --> 00:38:12,425
20 people associated or more 
with working in one of these  

649
00:38:12,425 --> 00:38:16,463
mines, 20-30 jobs. 
Quite a lot of jobs in the  

650
00:38:16,463 --> 00:38:19,065
construction industry right now, 
particularly up in Chippewa  

651
00:38:19,065 --> 00:38:21,835
Valley and areas like that and 
constructing some of the bigger,  

652
00:38:21,835 --> 00:38:26,239
newer plants. 
The demand for natural gas as a  

653
00:38:26,239 --> 00:38:29,843
clean fuel, I think, is going to 
be around for a while.  

654
00:38:29,843 --> 00:38:32,212
The time it will take us to 
phase out petroleum, even with  

655
00:38:32,212 --> 00:38:35,482
our best intentions, if we want 
to get away from petroleum based  

656
00:38:35,482 --> 00:38:38,551
fuels, I don't care what you 
say, we're not going to be able  

657
00:38:38,551 --> 00:38:42,856
to do it overnight, and there's 
going to be an interest to  

658
00:38:42,856 --> 00:38:47,494
develop our own resources here. 
So I think, number one, the  

659
00:38:47,494 --> 00:38:52,999
increasing use of natural gas as 
a fuel for generation of  

660
00:38:52,999 --> 00:38:57,637
electricity to replace coal is 
something that we've got not a  

661
00:38:57,637 --> 00:39:00,940
whole lot of choices, burn more 
coal, build more nukes, whatever  

662
00:39:00,940 --> 00:39:07,247
else, but gas has proven to be a 
good, clean fuel.  

663
00:39:07,247 --> 00:39:10,550
We're looking 5-10 years ago at 
importing liquified petroleum  

664
00:39:10,550 --> 00:39:16,022
gas from the Middle East. 
Today, with this technology and  

665
00:39:16,022 --> 00:39:18,625
some of those basins out in the 
west, we have the potential of  

666
00:39:18,625 --> 00:39:21,561
actually being self-sufficient 
in terms of our natural gas  

667
00:39:21,561 --> 00:39:24,964
supply.  

668
00:39:28,134 --> 00:39:30,470
Wisconsin has a 
hundred-year-plus history of  

669
00:39:30,470 --> 00:39:33,006
industrial sand mining. 
We've been mining sand, as I  

670
00:39:33,006 --> 00:39:36,276
say, for the foundry industry 
probably since the mid-19th  

671
00:39:36,276 --> 00:39:40,780
century with very few 
environmental or any other kind  

672
00:39:40,780 --> 00:39:45,585
of problems. 
And when we compare sand mining  

673
00:39:45,585 --> 00:39:49,522
to other types of mining, 
basically industrial sand mining  

674
00:39:49,522 --> 00:39:52,258
has a minimum environmental 
impact.  

675
00:39:52,258 --> 00:39:57,263
Sand mines are among the easier 
types of operations to reclaim.  

676
00:39:57,263 --> 00:39:59,532
If you've heard a little bit 
about the iron mine proposed up  

677
00:39:59,532 --> 00:40:04,537
north, that would be a definite 
contrast in terms of ease of  

678
00:40:04,537 --> 00:40:10,777
reclamation, but sand mining, 
basically, are fairly easy to  

679
00:40:10,777 --> 00:40:14,080
reclaim back into agricultural 
land or wild life habit,  

680
00:40:14,080 --> 00:40:18,485
whatever, and reclamation is now 
required by law in Wisconsin.  

681
00:40:18,485 --> 00:40:24,157
There's no way that you can mine 
without ultimately reclaiming.  

682
00:40:24,157 --> 00:40:26,993
Potential problems and issues 
that are out there, and you hear  

683
00:40:26,993 --> 00:40:31,064
these raised a lot. 
Groundwater usage and potential  

684
00:40:31,064 --> 00:40:33,900
for groundwater contamination.  

685
00:40:36,002 --> 00:40:39,372
You hear various concerns about 
the amount of water that some of  

686
00:40:39,372 --> 00:40:42,776
these operations use to process 
the sand.  

687
00:40:42,776 --> 00:40:47,013
As I'll say a little bit later, 
they're very efficient in terms  

688
00:40:47,013 --> 00:40:51,384
of how they recycle the water. 
Air quality is an issue that  

689
00:40:51,384 --> 00:40:54,220
there's been a lot of 
information and a lot of  

690
00:40:54,220 --> 00:40:57,390
misinformation put out about. 
Fugitive dust, risk from  

691
00:40:57,390 --> 00:41:01,928
breathing crystalline silica, 
these are all real things to  

692
00:41:01,928 --> 00:41:07,167
consider, but I think in the end 
we'll find they're very minor  

693
00:41:07,167 --> 00:41:13,640
when compared to other issues 
involved.  

694
00:41:13,640 --> 00:41:16,643
A huge one, which nobody really 
anticipated and has caused an  

695
00:41:16,643 --> 00:41:19,813
awful lot of concern, 
particularly political concern  

696
00:41:19,813 --> 00:41:23,917
among the town associations, 
county associations, various  

697
00:41:23,917 --> 00:41:27,020
local governments, is truck 
traffic.  

698
00:41:27,020 --> 00:41:30,490
Up until this time, all of our 
big operations, Badger,  

699
00:41:30,490 --> 00:41:35,395
operations over along the river, 
the underground mines, the mines  

700
00:41:35,395 --> 00:41:38,798
up in the east in the St. 
Peter have all been based on the  

701
00:41:38,798 --> 00:41:42,702
rail and rail transport. 
Now we're looking at a lot of  

702
00:41:42,702 --> 00:41:45,739
operations in places like 
Chippewa and Barron County where  

703
00:41:45,739 --> 00:41:50,543
they build a centralized plant 
and are going to truck this  

704
00:41:50,543 --> 00:41:55,548
material in from a series of 
different mines out here.  

705
00:41:55,548 --> 00:41:59,152
And there's a large plant by a 
company called EOG that's just  

706
00:41:59,152 --> 00:42:01,721
been built on the north side of 
Chippewa Falls, and they're  

707
00:42:01,721 --> 00:42:05,592
anticipating a truck a minute 
hauling into that plant during  

708
00:42:05,592 --> 00:42:09,195
their producing season. 
It's going through a roundabout,  

709
00:42:09,195 --> 00:42:12,098
one of my favorite traffic 
control devices, on the north  

710
00:42:12,098 --> 00:42:17,437
side of Chippewa Falls at 
highway 124 and S. And this is  

711
00:42:17,437 --> 00:42:20,006
going to be one a minute of 
these trucks going in there and  

712
00:42:20,006 --> 00:42:23,309
empties coming back. 
This is posing problems that  

713
00:42:23,309 --> 00:42:26,446
we've never had to deal with 
before which is one thing that's  

714
00:42:26,446 --> 00:42:29,749
going to be a lot of concern. 
Blasting and potential damage,  

715
00:42:29,749 --> 00:42:32,919
everybody's worried about that, 
but there's very little blasting  

716
00:42:32,919 --> 00:42:36,389
involved in sand mining. 
Noise levels, hours of  

717
00:42:36,389 --> 00:42:40,193
operation, these are things that 
where you do have zoning are  

718
00:42:40,193 --> 00:42:42,796
dealt with in the conditional 
use permit.  

719
00:42:42,796 --> 00:42:45,598
Reclamation and subsequent land 
use, there's always some  

720
00:42:45,598 --> 00:42:48,168
disagreements about that but 
there's no disagreement about  

721
00:42:48,168 --> 00:42:52,105
reclamation because reclamation 
is a requirement by law in the  

722
00:42:52,105 --> 00:42:54,774
state of Wisconsin. 
Any property before it can be  

723
00:42:54,774 --> 00:42:58,244
even opened and started is 
required to have a reclamation  

724
00:42:58,244 --> 00:43:01,481
plan in place. 
So how serious are the problems  

725
00:43:01,481 --> 00:43:05,151
and how do we deal with them? 
Groundwater use, DNR regulates  

726
00:43:05,151 --> 00:43:08,455
high capacity wells very 
closely, and high capacity wells  

727
00:43:08,455 --> 00:43:12,659
are wells that draw anything 
more than 70 gallons a minute.  

728
00:43:12,659 --> 00:43:15,495
This includes most industrial 
wells and irrigation wells, such  

729
00:43:15,495 --> 00:43:19,666
things as that. 
Permits are required to get a  

730
00:43:19,666 --> 00:43:25,405
fairly extensive review. 
I took part in a program up in  

731
00:43:25,405 --> 00:43:29,743
Barron County talking to their 
board and Laura Lynch from the  

732
00:43:29,743 --> 00:43:32,879
DNR who does a lot of the 
approval work gave a very good  

733
00:43:32,879 --> 00:43:36,516
summary of the procedures that 
go through and evaluating the  

734
00:43:36,516 --> 00:43:39,853
effects on trout streams and 
surface water and whatever else  

735
00:43:39,853 --> 00:43:43,723
in their municipal water 
supplies, so there's quite a bit  

736
00:43:43,723 --> 00:43:47,160
of review that goes into the 
water process.  

737
00:43:47,160 --> 00:43:51,364
When you look at it, I was 
involved up in Dune County and  

738
00:43:51,364 --> 00:43:54,868
permitting the original mine 
east of Menomonie and people  

739
00:43:54,868 --> 00:43:57,604
were looking out there and 
saying if this thing goes in  

740
00:43:57,604 --> 00:44:00,240
there, they're going to dry up 
everything we've got, they're  

741
00:44:00,240 --> 00:44:03,176
going to take all of our water. 
And you can see out from the  

742
00:44:03,176 --> 00:44:05,679
window probably about eight big 
center pivot irrigation wells  

743
00:44:05,679 --> 00:44:08,782
out there. 
And I said every time a farmer  

744
00:44:08,782 --> 00:44:11,885
turns one of those on, he's 
going to be using more water in  

745
00:44:11,885 --> 00:44:14,854
an hour than these guys are 
going to use in probably a day  

746
00:44:14,854 --> 00:44:19,025
or more or closer to a week's 
time.  

747
00:44:19,025 --> 00:44:22,529
But anyway, impact of private 
wells, this is something that  

748
00:44:22,529 --> 00:44:25,031
always an issue, it's an issue 
with aggregate mining, whatever  

749
00:44:25,031 --> 00:44:28,902
you're doing. 
We've had very good success in  

750
00:44:28,902 --> 00:44:31,738
the aggregate industry with 
companies and especially the  

751
00:44:31,738 --> 00:44:34,641
larger companies that come in 
who'll agree to do a well survey  

752
00:44:34,641 --> 00:44:37,410
and basically guarantee the 
water supply for their closer  

753
00:44:37,410 --> 00:44:40,146
neighbors. 
If something goes wrong that  

754
00:44:40,146 --> 00:44:42,916
they cause their water supply to 
dry up or they contaminate it or  

755
00:44:42,916 --> 00:44:46,319
whatever, they'll drill them a 
new well.  

756
00:44:46,319 --> 00:44:49,356
This time of arrangement has 
really worked very successfully.  

757
00:44:49,356 --> 00:44:52,058
We've had a number of cases over 
in eastern Wisconsin with deep  

758
00:44:52,058 --> 00:44:56,930
limestone mines. 
This has worked quite well.  

759
00:44:56,930 --> 00:44:59,466
And when you think about it when 
a company comes in and is going  

760
00:44:59,466 --> 00:45:02,335
to invest millions of dollars in 
a operation like this, it's a  

761
00:45:02,335 --> 00:45:06,239
very small amount to avoid 
future problems with your  

762
00:45:06,239 --> 00:45:10,176
neighbors. 
Water quality, where runoff and  

763
00:45:10,176 --> 00:45:13,346
surface water impact is 
regulated by the DNR just like  

764
00:45:13,346 --> 00:45:16,282
it is for any other kind of 
construction site or mining  

765
00:45:16,282 --> 00:45:19,586
operation. 
Sand mining really doesn't have  

766
00:45:19,586 --> 00:45:21,955
much more potential for 
groundwater impact than a  

767
00:45:21,955 --> 00:45:24,357
limestone quarry or a gravel 
pit.  

768
00:45:24,357 --> 00:45:28,094
It's just maybe a larger scale 
operation but in terms of any  

769
00:45:28,094 --> 00:45:32,298
kind of nasty materials that are 
used or anything, not much  

770
00:45:32,298 --> 00:45:37,003
difference. 
One issue that's of some concern  

771
00:45:37,003 --> 00:45:39,673
is the potential contamination 
from flocculants that are used  

772
00:45:39,673 --> 00:45:42,676
in the settling ponds because 
one of the things they do is  

773
00:45:42,676 --> 00:45:44,911
they recycle a lot of their 
water and they have to settle  

774
00:45:44,911 --> 00:45:47,580
out the fines. 
So they add flocculants, I think  

775
00:45:47,580 --> 00:45:53,086
it's polyacrylamides, and nobody 
is really quite sure where this  

776
00:45:53,086 --> 00:45:55,722
stuff goes or what happens to 
it.  

777
00:45:55,722 --> 00:45:58,258
There's no specific regulations 
on it.  

778
00:45:58,258 --> 00:46:02,762
But there's never been any 
problems on record with it, and  

779
00:46:02,762 --> 00:46:06,332
if you think about it, many of 
those same chemicals, if you  

780
00:46:06,332 --> 00:46:09,769
drink Milwaukee's water, that's 
the same thing they're using in  

781
00:46:09,769 --> 00:46:15,442
that to basically settle out the 
sediment.  

782
00:46:18,745 --> 00:46:23,116
Air quality issues are something 
that's really gotten to be a big  

783
00:46:23,116 --> 00:46:26,720
issue in western Wisconsin. 
One thing about it, frac sand  

784
00:46:26,720 --> 00:46:30,757
requires clean, round, unbroken 
grains.  

785
00:46:30,757 --> 00:46:33,426
Process involves disaggregation 
and screening.  

786
00:46:33,426 --> 00:46:36,563
It's usually done wet rather 
than any kind of grinding or  

787
00:46:36,563 --> 00:46:39,199
crushing operation because the 
last thing you want to do is  

788
00:46:39,199 --> 00:46:41,935
break grains, make them angular, 
then their not going to meet  

789
00:46:41,935 --> 00:46:44,371
your specks. 
Frac sand plant will produce  

790
00:46:44,371 --> 00:46:48,508
probably less angular 
crystalline silica dust than a  

791
00:46:48,508 --> 00:46:51,911
quarry that crushes quartzite, 
say up at Baraboo or anywhere  

792
00:46:51,911 --> 00:46:55,482
like that, or a gravel pit for 
that matter that dry crushes  

793
00:46:55,482 --> 00:47:01,121
fairly coarse cobble material 
and does it without any  

794
00:47:01,121 --> 00:47:05,759
particular dust control 
measures.  

795
00:47:05,759 --> 00:47:11,531
Most plants are just a matter of 
a lot of the processing, as I  

796
00:47:11,531 --> 00:47:14,734
say in the initial screening, is 
done wet in the first place.  

797
00:47:14,734 --> 00:47:18,338
There are standard ways to 
minimize dust which is very  

798
00:47:18,338 --> 00:47:21,508
important, good industry 
practices.  

799
00:47:21,508 --> 00:47:24,678
Such as watering them down haul 
roads, paving roads, spraying  

800
00:47:24,678 --> 00:47:29,382
conveyor belts, even installing 
wash baths for truck tires.  

801
00:47:29,382 --> 00:47:31,718
This is a very successful 
technique that we've seen used  

802
00:47:31,718 --> 00:47:35,422
in a lot of limestone quarries 
where tracking this dust  

803
00:47:35,422 --> 00:47:39,359
material out on to a highway or 
something and then having  

804
00:47:39,359 --> 00:47:41,861
traffic kick it up has caused 
all kind of problems.  

805
00:47:41,861 --> 00:47:44,898
They build a shallow pan, maybe 
eight inches deep full of water  

806
00:47:44,898 --> 00:47:48,468
that the trucks drive through, 
washes their wheels clean.  

807
00:47:48,468 --> 00:47:53,106
They have no problems with it. 
But the DNR is very fussy in  

808
00:47:53,106 --> 00:47:57,143
their air quality standards 
about controlling fugitive dust,  

809
00:47:57,143 --> 00:48:00,246
and complaints about these kinds 
of things will generally result  

810
00:48:00,246 --> 00:48:04,317
in the DNR coming in there and 
requiring some of these  

811
00:48:04,317 --> 00:48:08,388
techniques be used. 
Most major operators do this as  

812
00:48:08,388 --> 00:48:12,425
a matter of routine. 
For the actual workplace  

813
00:48:12,425 --> 00:48:16,396
conditions, Mine Safety 
Administration and OSHA have  

814
00:48:16,396 --> 00:48:22,702
very strict workplace standards 
and very tight restrictions on  

815
00:48:22,702 --> 00:48:27,307
how much particulate silica can 
be in a cubic meter of air in  

816
00:48:27,307 --> 00:48:33,613
the work environment. 
And if it's that clean at the  

817
00:48:33,613 --> 00:48:36,282
site, you're probably not going 
to have a whole lot of problems  

818
00:48:36,282 --> 00:48:40,720
at distances, although there's 
some probably necessary studies  

819
00:48:40,720 --> 00:48:44,391
to be done to collect some of 
that data.  

820
00:48:44,391 --> 00:48:46,659
Operating issues, really 
blasting, everybody is concerned  

821
00:48:46,659 --> 00:48:49,162
about it. 
It's regulating by the  

822
00:48:49,162 --> 00:48:51,398
Department of Commerce. 
If you've got a complaint,  

823
00:48:51,398 --> 00:48:53,600
that's where you go. 
Blasting is used only to loosen  

824
00:48:53,600 --> 00:48:56,069
material. 
I know of a number of companies  

825
00:48:56,069 --> 00:48:58,938
that have used it to break up 
rock and loosen it a bit and  

826
00:48:58,938 --> 00:49:02,208
then they go in there and 
basically drive a Cat back and  

827
00:49:02,208 --> 00:49:04,978
forth a few times and get the 
stuff broken up enough that they  

828
00:49:04,978 --> 00:49:10,350
can get it into the wash plant. 
But if it's too heavily cemented  

829
00:49:10,350 --> 00:49:13,453
to where you've got to use a lot 
of powder to blast it, it's not  

830
00:49:13,453 --> 00:49:17,691
even going to make specks for 
frac sand.  

831
00:49:17,691 --> 00:49:21,895
The traffic operating schedule, 
road maintenance, these things  

832
00:49:21,895 --> 00:49:25,198
are best handle on conditional 
use permit.  

833
00:49:25,198 --> 00:49:28,034
But the problem is that an awful 
lot of places that mining  

834
00:49:28,034 --> 00:49:30,670
companies will come into just 
because of the convenience have  

835
00:49:30,670 --> 00:49:33,773
no zoning. 
I was talking about a town's  

836
00:49:33,773 --> 00:49:38,945
association earlier this year 
and one of the executives there  

837
00:49:38,945 --> 00:49:42,082
was saying a lot of these towns 
used to be very militant about  

838
00:49:42,082 --> 00:49:45,719
this idea of we don't want 
zoning, we aren't going to have  

839
00:49:45,719 --> 00:49:48,421
anybody telling us what we're 
going to do for our land use.  

840
00:49:48,421 --> 00:49:50,924
We're not going to have anybody 
in here telling us we've got to  

841
00:49:50,924 --> 00:49:53,693
keep it all as prime 
agriculture, whatever.  

842
00:49:53,693 --> 00:49:56,296
But then as soon as somebody 
comes in and proposes a 500-acre  

843
00:49:56,296 --> 00:50:00,266
sand mine, they start to sing a 
little bit different tune.  

844
00:50:00,266 --> 00:50:05,839
But anyway, there's generally an 
opportunity to sit down,  

845
00:50:05,839 --> 00:50:08,908
particularly with many of the 
bigger companies, and make some  

846
00:50:08,908 --> 00:50:12,112
negotiations. 
Town of Howard up in Chippewa  

847
00:50:12,112 --> 00:50:14,981
County is very successful at 
this and there's several others  

848
00:50:14,981 --> 00:50:17,550
since that have done that. 
Reclamation.  

849
00:50:17,550 --> 00:50:19,919
People think that these outfits 
can walk away afterward if  

850
00:50:19,919 --> 00:50:22,989
something goes wrong. 
Reclamation is regulated under  

851
00:50:22,989 --> 00:50:26,960
NR 135 in the Department of 
Natural Resources.  

852
00:50:26,960 --> 00:50:30,296
Reclamation plan is subject to 
public comment and approval.  

853
00:50:30,296 --> 00:50:33,433
You've got to have a public 
hearing associated with it.  

854
00:50:33,433 --> 00:50:37,203
It is required to be submitted 
before you can ever turn a spade  

855
00:50:37,203 --> 00:50:40,440
of dirt at one of these 
operations, and a company has to  

856
00:50:40,440 --> 00:50:44,811
post financial assurance in the 
form of a bond that's an  

857
00:50:44,811 --> 00:50:48,882
irrevocable bond. 
You can't say, well, some other  

858
00:50:48,882 --> 00:50:52,085
creditor will take that when 
they go broke.  

859
00:50:52,085 --> 00:50:55,955
No, it has to be specifically 
set aside for reclamation so  

860
00:50:55,955 --> 00:50:59,059
that the county or the local 
government, whatever, is not  

861
00:50:59,059 --> 00:51:01,661
going to get stuck with the cost 
of cleaning up a site.  

862
00:51:01,661 --> 00:51:07,100
That has to be in place before 
any mining begins.  

863
00:51:07,100 --> 00:51:10,503
The good news is that we've had 
a hundred-year history of sand  

864
00:51:10,503 --> 00:51:13,873
mining with very few problems. 
Most environmental issues can be  

865
00:51:13,873 --> 00:51:17,544
dealt with under existing 
regulations and by using  

866
00:51:17,544 --> 00:51:21,815
existing technology and applying 
best industry standard  

867
00:51:21,815 --> 00:51:25,819
practices. 
Many new mines now, this is the  

868
00:51:25,819 --> 00:51:28,855
one that, as I said earlier, is 
really the problem that's  

869
00:51:28,855 --> 00:51:32,592
causing troubles out there, rely 
on truck transport.  

870
00:51:32,592 --> 00:51:34,961
This means traffic and safety 
issues, potential road  

871
00:51:34,961 --> 00:51:38,131
maintenance issues need to be 
resolved.  

872
00:51:38,131 --> 00:51:40,867
We're seeing some real progress 
among some of the western  

873
00:51:40,867 --> 00:51:43,236
counties. 
There's even some that are  

874
00:51:43,236 --> 00:51:46,706
trying to make an assessment on 
companies to help pay for the  

875
00:51:46,706 --> 00:51:49,676
road costs. 
But the DOT is also very  

876
00:51:49,676 --> 00:51:53,913
concerned about this too because 
it's putting a lot of extra wear  

877
00:51:53,913 --> 00:51:57,884
and loading on to state roads. 
So there's quite a bit being  

878
00:51:57,884 --> 00:52:00,653
done about this right now to 
work the issues out.  

879
00:52:00,653 --> 00:52:03,990
Operational issues can usually 
be resolved by the zoning or by  

880
00:52:03,990 --> 00:52:07,460
negotiation. 
And as new mines come into  

881
00:52:07,460 --> 00:52:11,131
production, I think the big 
thing is that we've just seen a  

882
00:52:11,131 --> 00:52:15,301
huge rush in the last year 
that's basically overwhelmed a  

883
00:52:15,301 --> 00:52:18,071
lot of the western counties and 
they haven't be able to really  

884
00:52:18,071 --> 00:52:21,141
keep up with it, but as some of 
these new mines come into  

885
00:52:21,141 --> 00:52:23,877
production, particularly some of 
the large ones up in the  

886
00:52:23,877 --> 00:52:28,048
Chippewa County area, the demand 
should be met and the pace of  

887
00:52:28,048 --> 00:52:31,251
development should slow down in 
time to work out the remaining  

888
00:52:31,251 --> 00:52:34,888
issues. 
One thing I might add at this  

889
00:52:34,888 --> 00:52:37,624
point is that Wisconsin is not 
the only place that does have  

890
00:52:37,624 --> 00:52:40,093
sand that is suitable for frac 
sand.  

891
00:52:40,093 --> 00:52:43,697
There is other sands of lesser 
qualities, and a number of  

892
00:52:43,697 --> 00:52:46,499
companies are pouring a lot of 
money into developing these  

893
00:52:46,499 --> 00:52:49,669
resources in areas like Texas 
and Oklahoma, which are actually  

894
00:52:49,669 --> 00:52:53,373
closer in some cases, 
transportation wise, to the  

895
00:52:53,373 --> 00:52:58,011
actual oil and gas fields. 
The difference is that most of  

896
00:52:58,011 --> 00:53:02,449
those sands are down there 
around 4,000 PSI or 6,000 PSI  

897
00:53:02,449 --> 00:53:06,453
crushing strength, and they 
can't meet the standards that we  

898
00:53:06,453 --> 00:53:09,322
have which go up as high as 
12,000 and 14,000 for some of  

899
00:53:09,322 --> 00:53:13,827
the best of the sands from the 
Jordan formation in western  

900
00:53:13,827 --> 00:53:16,496
Wisconsin. 
But there's going to be a big  

901
00:53:16,496 --> 00:53:19,632
shake out in the industry, I 
predict, within the next year or  

902
00:53:19,632 --> 00:53:24,804
so because as this comes online, 
we're going to see, right now  

903
00:53:24,804 --> 00:53:30,677
you could go buy a farm out in 
Trempealeau County, Bubba's  

904
00:53:30,677 --> 00:53:33,413
Trucking and Excavating. 
He's got a back hoe and two or  

905
00:53:33,413 --> 00:53:35,849
three dump trucks. 
He can go out there, start  

906
00:53:35,849 --> 00:53:39,386
digging sand out of some 
farmer's backyard, hauling it  

907
00:53:39,386 --> 00:53:43,723
down to Winona, Minnesota, 
loading it on the Union Pacific  

908
00:53:43,723 --> 00:53:47,260
and selling it to a sand company 
down there that has a loading  

909
00:53:47,260 --> 00:53:49,729
facility, and that stuff is 
going down there and selling for  

910
00:53:49,729 --> 00:53:53,199
$300 or $400 a ton which at the 
wellhead which is pretty  

911
00:53:53,199 --> 00:53:55,669
amazing. 
Once they process it, they can  

912
00:53:55,669 --> 00:54:00,140
haul it down there, process it 
down in Texas and sell it at the  

913
00:54:00,140 --> 00:54:02,776
wellhead. 
Well, as soon as the supply  

914
00:54:02,776 --> 00:54:06,212
starts to come up, there's going 
to be some major changes in the  

915
00:54:06,212 --> 00:54:09,215
economics. 
We've got some huge capacity  

916
00:54:09,215 --> 00:54:12,786
being built into some of the big 
plants like EOG up in Chippewa  

917
00:54:12,786 --> 00:54:17,624
Falls, Winn Bay Sands in 
Trempealeau County, Badger has  

918
00:54:17,624 --> 00:54:21,895
put a lot in into expanding 
their capacity, and I think  

919
00:54:21,895 --> 00:54:24,497
we're going to see a settling 
out of the industry in the next  

920
00:54:24,497 --> 00:54:29,269
couple years. 
So what can we expect?  

921
00:54:29,269 --> 00:54:31,571
The sandstone formations in 
Wisconsin and Minnesota are the  

922
00:54:31,571 --> 00:54:34,774
best. 
Well, that's a fact of life.  

923
00:54:34,774 --> 00:54:37,143
It just happened to be because 
we've got the good stuff that's  

924
00:54:37,143 --> 00:54:39,779
available very easily and 
mineable at the surface.  

925
00:54:39,779 --> 00:54:42,649
As long as fracking is the best 
available technology, which  

926
00:54:42,649 --> 00:54:46,119
right now it is for producing 
previously unrecoverable natural  

927
00:54:46,119 --> 00:54:50,390
gas, frac sand mining is going 
to continue to be a big business  

928
00:54:50,390 --> 00:54:52,759
in our region. 
There's going to be a demand for  

929
00:54:52,759 --> 00:54:56,129
it. 
And I think that I'm not sure  

930
00:54:56,129 --> 00:54:59,833
what kind of technology will 
ever replace it, but the fact  

931
00:54:59,833 --> 00:55:04,404
that it has brought us from 
total dependence to almost  

932
00:55:04,404 --> 00:55:09,376
self-sufficiency on natural gas 
and it's released a tremendous  

933
00:55:09,376 --> 00:55:13,513
amount more petroleum that we 
won't be dependent on foreign  

934
00:55:13,513 --> 00:55:17,851
imports, I think there's going 
to be a demand for it for a  

935
00:55:17,851 --> 00:55:21,254
while, at least into the future. 
Interest in Wisconsin sands  

936
00:55:21,254 --> 00:55:25,725
growing but the boom took us by 
surprise.  

937
00:55:25,725 --> 00:55:28,228
Counties were overwhelmed with 
applications.  

938
00:55:28,228 --> 00:55:30,964
The scale is what really has 
presented problems that we  

939
00:55:30,964 --> 00:55:33,433
haven't dealt with before, like 
I mentioned early, the guy in  

940
00:55:33,433 --> 00:55:37,203
Trempealeau County had four or 
five little stone quarries to  

941
00:55:37,203 --> 00:55:41,074
deal with, now he finds he's got 
20 sand mines.  

942
00:55:43,810 --> 00:55:47,247
But he's actually doing a very 
good job of dealing with it.  

943
00:55:47,247 --> 00:55:50,950
So conclusions that we can come 
to out of this, I'm going to  

944
00:55:50,950 --> 00:55:54,120
wrap it up here. 
Mother nature didn't give us any  

945
00:55:54,120 --> 00:55:56,756
of the oil and gas. 
We don't have any energy,  

946
00:55:56,756 --> 00:55:59,659
basically, in Wisconsin. 
We're strictly a consumer state.  

947
00:55:59,659 --> 00:56:02,662
But we did get the sand that's 
now exactly what they want and  

948
00:56:02,662 --> 00:56:07,867
need to produce what they could 
never produce before.  

949
00:56:07,867 --> 00:56:10,704
There's a few problems in the 
process, but I think ultimately  

950
00:56:10,704 --> 00:56:14,874
that will get worked out. 
It produces material very  

951
00:56:14,874 --> 00:56:18,945
efficiently. 
You think about back when I took  

952
00:56:18,945 --> 00:56:22,615
petroleum geology, you used to 
hear that we were only  

953
00:56:22,615 --> 00:56:25,552
recovering something like 20% of 
the potential from a particular  

954
00:56:25,552 --> 00:56:30,090
oil field. 
So we're really increasing our  

955
00:56:30,090 --> 00:56:34,461
efficiency and wasting less 
fuel.  

956
00:56:34,461 --> 00:56:38,231
Frac sand mining should really 
be continued as a strong a  

957
00:56:38,231 --> 00:56:41,034
stable industry as long as 
there's a demand for  

958
00:56:41,034 --> 00:56:45,538
hydrocarbons and we wish to 
reduce our dependence on  

959
00:56:45,538 --> 00:56:48,375
imports. 
And I think that's a goal that  

960
00:56:48,375 --> 00:56:51,644
everybody has. 
We would like to reduce our  

961
00:56:51,644 --> 00:56:54,581
dependence on hydrocarbons, but 
I think it's going to take us a  

962
00:56:54,581 --> 00:56:57,484
number of years, realistically, 
before we can really wean  

963
00:56:57,484 --> 00:57:00,086
ourselves completely away from 
it.  

964
00:57:00,086 --> 00:57:03,189
But I think the current boom is 
going to settle down as supply  

965
00:57:03,189 --> 00:57:06,526
catches up with demand. 
And this is going to happen, it  

966
00:57:06,526 --> 00:57:12,899
may happen as a pretty big event 
at the time because I think  

967
00:57:12,899 --> 00:57:15,835
we're going to see a lot of 
these little guys who are  

968
00:57:15,835 --> 00:57:18,238
producing, small producers out 
there, either being swallowed up  

969
00:57:18,238 --> 00:57:20,774
by the larger companies or 
they're going to be put out of  

970
00:57:20,774 --> 00:57:23,777
business because you can't 
afford the truck haul of hauling  

971
00:57:23,777 --> 00:57:28,448
this and paying for diesel fuel 
to haul this stuff by truck when  

972
00:57:28,448 --> 00:57:34,287
you have some large companies 
who had their own rail siding,  

973
00:57:34,287 --> 00:57:38,191
own their own cars and 
locomotives, they can basically  

974
00:57:38,191 --> 00:57:41,294
spot a 60-car unit train on 
there that the railroad just  

975
00:57:41,294 --> 00:57:43,630
comes and picks up and ships 
out.  

976
00:57:43,630 --> 00:57:46,332
And that's the way you get your 
best rates on shipping.  

977
00:57:46,332 --> 00:57:50,904
And any of this kind of stuff, 
the one big factor in there is  

978
00:57:50,904 --> 00:57:54,708
transportation. 
Efficient producers are going to  

979
00:57:54,708 --> 00:57:57,510
be some of the larger companies 
that have been in the business a  

980
00:57:57,510 --> 00:57:59,846
long time. 
We've got about three types of  

981
00:57:59,846 --> 00:58:02,215
companies. 
We've got the old time sand  

982
00:58:02,215 --> 00:58:05,819
companies like Unimin, US 
Silica, Badger Mining, Gelhar,  

983
00:58:05,819 --> 00:58:08,221
these people know what they're 
doing.  

984
00:58:08,221 --> 00:58:10,457
They've been in the business a 
long time.  

985
00:58:10,457 --> 00:58:12,992
We've got the carpetbaggers 
who've come in who are, in many  

986
00:58:12,992 --> 00:58:16,129
cases, oil companies who've 
tried to cut the middle man out,  

987
00:58:16,129 --> 00:58:19,866
and all they want to do is get 
their own source of sand.  

988
00:58:19,866 --> 00:58:22,535
They may or may not stay in that 
business, and then we've got all  

989
00:58:22,535 --> 00:58:25,905
the small guys out there who are 
making a killing right now  

990
00:58:25,905 --> 00:58:29,042
because of the high price for 
sand, but they're going to be  

991
00:58:29,042 --> 00:58:33,146
put out, I think, of business by 
the lack of access to rail.  

992
00:58:33,146 --> 00:58:36,216
The survivors are going to be 
the ones that can ship the  

993
00:58:36,216 --> 00:58:39,386
product efficiently, and that's 
going to be one of the major  

994
00:58:39,386 --> 00:58:42,455
factors. 
So with that, I will conclude.  

995
00:58:42,455 --> 00:58:44,791
[APPLAUSE]