Phosphate mining creates our largest land impacts, including wetlands at Aurora and White Springs. PotashCorp’s permits and agreements with federal, state and local authorities require us to preserve sensitive lands from mining, to enhance or restore public lands and to grant conservation easements, offsite mitigation and defined contributions for public acquisition of environmentally sensitive lands in the regions.
Mitigation is required for all wetlands disturbed for our mining operations. Most of the mitigation is achieved by restoration or recreation, though some has been completed by preservation. As part of land reclamation, PotashCorp plants an average of 30,000-40,000 trees at operation sites annually. That number can rise significantly during peak phases of the reclamation process. At Aurora, we have replaced more than 1.5 acres of wetlands for every acre mined. This ratio will increase to two to one with the new mining permit. At White Springs, the ratio has varied over time and type of mitigation.