Crews replace soil as part of remediation efforts in St. Francois County. Doe Run continues to make progress on historic mine site remediation projects.
Soil and Land Services remediates yards in St. Francois County. Doe Run continues to make progress on historic mine site remediation projects.

Settlers flocked to this region more than 300 years ago to mine one of the largest and purest lead ore deposits in the world. Today, Doe Run is the only remaining lead mining company operating in Southeast Missouri, and we play a role in remediating many closed sites.

“In the 1970s, lead mining in Missouri moved from the area known as the Old Lead Belt south to the Viburnum Trend, where Doe Run currently mines. However, former mine sites operated by legacy companies require remediation by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),” said Chris Neaville, asset development director. “We are restoring many of these historic mine sites, giving them new purpose or reclaiming the land.” 

In 2020, we continued to make progress at several remediation sites.

Herculaneum

We remediated five acres of former residential property in Herculaneum to provide a bus parking lot and maintenance building for the Dunklin R-V School District. Relocating the district’s bus facilities to the new site enabled the local elementary school to build more classrooms. Also in Herculaneum, the Riverview Commerce Park, LLC (RCP) port continued to ship fracking sand and grain along the Mississippi River. The port is located on 18 acres of riverfront property once owned by Doe Run, and continues to bring economic opportunities to the area.

Glover

At another former operations site in Glover, we made progress remediating a creek on-site and capping a permitted slag storage area with soil. Slag is the byproduct from the smelting process.

Old Lead Belt

Early settlers began surface mining in the area known as the Old Lead Belt more than 300 years ago. Over the years, Doe Run has remediated many of these former sites. In 2020, Soil and Land Services (S&L) remediated 86 residential yards in St. Francois County, and remediation will continue to ramp up in 2021. Also in the Old Lead Belt, Doe Run completed a pilot study to remove sediment from the Big River, using an innovative pump system for frack sand mining. The study will help the EPA understand how it can best remove sediment while minimizing the use of construction equipment in the river.

Back to Sustainability Report