North Carolina environmental officials are asking a state judge to force the company that operated an unpermitted mine in Mitchell County to prevent pollution they say is running off the site and into the Nolichucky River.
In a Feb. 17 filing in Mitchell County Superior Court, the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality and N.C. Department of Justice sought a preliminary injunction against Horizon 30.
The state alleges that sediment pollution from the site outside of Poplar constitutes continuing violations of the state's Mining Act. It is asking for additional action from the courts to force Horizon 30 to remediate its quarry.
"This type of pollution is exactly what the Mining Act was adopted to avoid, including the violation of surface water quality standards in adjoining waterways," Carolyn McLain, a N.C. Department of Justice attorney, wrote in the complaint.
On Feb. 4, Horizon 30 separately received a formal notice of intent to sue from environmental groups who alleged that acid mine drainage and sediment are running off of the site into nearby waterways.
Horizon 30 began operating the quarry outside Poplar in early 2025 without obtaining necessary mining permits from the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality. The operation, which was part of the effort to rebuild CSX's railbed through the Nolichucky Gorge that was destroyed by Helene's floodwaters, only stopped after DEQ sued in early August and a state judge issued an injunction against the work.
As part of that ruling, Horizon 30 was ordered to apply for and enact a remediation plan for the roughly 30 once-forested acres where it had been digging along the Nolichucky River.
DEQ ended up approving that plan in December.
But by then, an inspector had already found evidence of "severe" sediment pollution at the site.
During a Sept. 30 site visit, a N.C. Division of Energy, Mineral and Land Resources inspector found that while mining had stopped, the site was unstable.
"Sediment has washed into the Nolichucky River from the mine site (through) two stormdrain pipes under the railroad track," the inspector wrote. "Sediment damage is severe to the river and is ongoing."
The inspector urged Horizon 30 to establish groundcover everywhere it had dug, repair slopes where stormwater had formed gullies, and install additional erosion measures to control sediment.
On October 21, two DEMLR inspectors visited the site, once again finding "severe" and "ongoing" sediment pollution. They came back six days later and once again saw turbid water running into the river, as well as overland into nearby Hollow Poplar Creek.
N.C. Division of Water Resources staff also visited the site October 27, sampling nearby waterways for turbidity. The river has a turbidity limit of 50 nephelometric turbidity units, which measures water's cloudiness, while the creek has a limit of 10 NTU because trout use it.
All of the samples taken downstream of the two Horizon 30 discharges to the Nolichucky River contained more turbidity than DEMLR's instruments could measure.
That was also true of the turbidity in the creek. Water resources staff described observing sediment that was 14 inches deep in the creek, extending about 500 feet downstream.
By comparison, a sample taken from the river upstream of the discharges contained 1.9 NTU, while one taken from the creek upstream of the discharge contained 7.7 NTU. Those are both below state limits.
DEMLR staff continued to observe pollution during three additional inspections in November and December.
During a January 12 inspection, a DEMLR inspector found that while some reclamation had occurred, it was inconsistent with the now-approved plan. Once again, the inspector
On January 23, Stan Aiken, the regional engineer in DEMLR's Asheville regional office, sent Horizon 30 a notice of continuing violation and said the site had been referred to the division director for enforcement actions.
Horizon 30, Aiken wrote, needs to "prevent any further off-site sediment damage from occurring," stabilize slopes, establish ground cover in any bare areas of the site, and install additional erosion control measures, among other steps.
Horizon 30's owners have contended in letters to DEQ that they completed remediation shortly after the judge's orders in a way that should be satisfactory to state mining officials.
Company officials did not respond to a request for comment for this story.
"Had (Horizon 30) applied for and received a mining permit prior to initiating mining activities, Defendant would have then been able to engineer, plan, implement and install temporary and permanent sediment control measures in advance of mining operations to avoid destabilization of the mine site and resulting sediment impacts to the adjoining waterways. But that is not what happened," McLain wrote in the Feb. 17 complaint.
State officials are asking the judge to force Horizon 30 to comply with its approved reclamation plan, to stabilize all bare areas on the former quarry site and to seek a sediment removal from DEQ for Hollow Poplar Creek.
Environmental groups allege acid mine drainage
Horizon 30 has failed in its remediation efforts, environmental groups MountainTrue and Center for Biological Diversity are alleging, resulting in ongoing pollution reaching a once-pristine river that is already suffering from other Helene-related impacts.
"This out-of-state limited liability company just came in and kind of tore up this mountain and then just left it. We do not think there's been a proper reclamation of the site done. And until that's done, this pollution is just going to continue to flow into the Nolichucky River," said Jamie Whitlock, a Southern Environmental Law Center senior attorney who is representing the groups.
The 60-day notice SELC filed Feb. 4 is necessary before a lawsuit can be filed under the Clean Water Act.
The environmental groups said in their notice that they have sampled what they called "an orange, discolored liquid with a filmy sheen" and a sulfiric odor that is draining off the site.
A sample taken from liquid draining off of the quarry at the southernmost of two seeps contained 31,400 parts per billion of iron, 4,360 ppb of manganese and 104 ppb of aluminum, as well as barium, cobalt and nickel.
The environmental groups found a similar liquid coming from the site at its northern-most seep, with sample results showing 4,980 ppb of iron, 980 ppb of manganese and 38.7 ppb of aluminum.
Horizon 30 also said in applications that they intended to obtain a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit from DEQ, something that they never did. Under the federal Clean Water Act, no pollutant can be discharged directly into a navigable water unless the operator has received a permit.
Horizon 30 faces fines
If DEMLR fines Horizon 30, it will not be the first time.
Violations of the state's Mining Act can be penalized by fines of as much as $5,000 each day.
In early December, the agency issued a civil penalty assessment of $460,000 against the company, a consequence, agency head Toby Vinson wrote, of operating without a permit from May 6 to August 6.
The civil penalty assessment describes how DEMLR employees sent Horizon 30 a notice on March 7, 2025, officially informing the company that it needed a permit to dig.
Over roughly the next two months, Fernandes and other company officials contacted agency staff at least 11 times saying a full application or payment were imminent. In each of those cases, the agency did not actually receive what was promised until later, according to the penalty assessment.
In one case, Sean Chipman on April 3 told DEMLR staff hard copies "are on the way." A week later, agency officials asked Chipman for the tracking information of those hard copies. He responded with a photo showing a package that was scheduled to be shipped that day via overnight postage.
When the package arrived April 11, it did not contain required application fees.
North Carolina's mining agency never granted Horizon 30 a permit for the Mitchell County operation. Still, the company is challenging the $460,000 penalty, Kat Russell, a DEMLR spokeswoman, wrote in an email.
