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The United States Army Corps of Engineers (“Corps”) (Vicksburg District) issued a June 12 public notice regarding a proposed project in Ouachita County, Arkansas, that is seeking a Clean Water Act Section 404 permit.

The Corps public notice states that Highland Pellets South, LLC (“Highland”) has submitted an application for a such permit which would enable the construction of a facility to manufacture wood pellets to be used in coal-fired power plants as fuel.

The 404 permit is necessitated because certain activities would take place in jurisdictional areas.

The proposed work is described as the grading and filling of certain land to construct the facility. The public notice further states that the facility:

. . . will have a rail line connected to the existing main railroad line that borders the property to the east. Having a rail line connection will allow the pellets to be distributed to the power plants with greater efficiency than trucking the material.

The project site is stated to contain a total of 14.95 acres of wetlands and 12,399 linear feet of streams. It is projected to fill 2.97 acres of jurisdictional wetlands and 3,297 linear feet of ephemeral stream, and culvert 789 linear feet of ephemeral stream.

As to mitigation, the public notice states in part:

Upon reviewing this notice, you should write to this office to provide your opinion of the impacts this work will have on the natural and human environment and address any mitigation you believe is necessary to offset these impacts.

A copy of the public notice can be downloaded here.