Sylvia Lake, NY
Our Neighbor: Empire State Mines
Empire State Mines' Community Response Line: 1-800-632-9709
This number will allow callers to leave a voicemail 24 hours a day / 7 days a week and the appropriate person from the mines will follow up with the caller as soon as possible, but at the very least within 2 working days. This will allow community members to voice their comments and concerns and will allow ESM to hear the concerns and get the right information and people involved to handle the issues. ESM want's to address concerns, with streamlined, effective, accurate, and respectful communication between neighbors.
The Empire State Mine (“ESM”) is an underground zinc mine located in Fowler, New York, near the town of Gouverneur. ESM is comprised of a group of high-grade mines: ESM #4 mine which is in production and six historic mines. ESM #4 mine restarted mining operations in January 2018 and began producing zinc concentrate in March 2018. The ESM #1, #2 and #3, Hyatt, Pierrepont and Edwards mines are all within a 30-mile radius of the 5,000 tons-per-day (tpd) mill.
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Location: Town of Fowler, NY
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Property: controls more than 80,000 acres of mineral rights of which approximately 2,700 acres have both fee simple surface and mineral rights
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1,754 acres near Gouverneur where the ESM #4 mine, mill and tailings disposal facility are located
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703 acres in the town of Edwards, including the Edwards mine
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242 acres covering the Pierrepont mine
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Primary metal: zinc
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Secondary metals: none
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Type of mining: underground
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The following slides were presented to interested residents at the December 14, 2021 meeting.
Download this presentation
Fowler residents concerned about new mining roads
Published: Dec. 15, 2021 at 6:11 AM EST by Brendan Straub, WWNY-TV
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FOWLER, New York (WWNY) - Empire State Mines in the town of Fowler is expanding its operation.
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It was a packed house in the town of Fowler on Tuesday evening (December 14, 2021) with dozens filing into the town hall to hear more about Titan Mining’s next project at Empire State Mines. The company is planning to begin open-pit mining in two locations near its number two mine, an opportunity for more job growth “Roughly 10 more jobs directly and a couple more indirect,” Titan Mines general manager Joel Rheault said.
In doing so, an access road is needed to help transport zinc ore to its main plant on the other side of Sylvia Lake.
That road will cross over East Shore Road and Pump House Road. Both are in residential areas. which has some locals concerned. “They didn’t tell us they were starting,” Alan Hopper said. “We just happened to begin to see construction vehicles, the logging operation going on.” Hopper is one of a handful of year-round residents on Pump House Road. He says early work on creating the access road has left parts of their road a mess. “With the muck and the saltation, the erosion that was going on, it became nearly impassable at times,” Hopper said.
Titan Mining has since cleared the road but it’s problems like these that Hopper and others are concerned about moving forward. They raised concerns about safety at these intersections and questioned who will have the right of way. Titan general manager Rheault did address that. “The road traffic on Pump House Road and East Shore Road trying to access either the boat launch or the residences along Sylvia Lake would have priority,” he said.
Rheault says they are also evaluating different traffic patterns that would make the intersections as safe as possible. He says mining at the new sites isn’t expected to begin until early spring of 2022 and would last at least a couple years.
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