PROJECT HIGHLIGHTS
Nine Mile Road Project
MOAC provided monitoring and data recovery services for the Nine Mile Road Improvement Project between 2011 and 2014. Over 35 major subsurface discoveries were made over the course of the project. Following protocols and procedures created for the WTP PA, MOAC was able to not only thoroughly document and mitigate impact to these resources but was able to do so with minimal delays for the road construction crews in most instances. Data collected from the discovery sites are helping to significantly further our understanding of the canyon's prehistoric inhabitants. With data collected from the sites, MOAC archaeologists have significantly refined the canyon's cultural chronology, identified ancient maize storage processing techniques, and uncovered evidence of shifting regional influences.
Natural Buttes Cultural Resource Inventory
MOAC completed an inventory of over 141,300 acres (220 square miles) as part of the Greater Natural Buttes Unit (NBU) natural gas development in the Uintah Basin of northeastern Utah. The purpose of the exhaustive inventory of the entire APE was to expedite the Section 106 process with the BLM, BIA, and SHPO. To date, hundreds of wells and associated access roads and pipelines have been constructed while avoiding direct impacts to archaeological sites through careful planning and development. The inventory itself, which was broken into 16 smaller projects for management purposes, resulted in the identification of 1,828 archaeological sites spanning over 10,000 years of human history. Using data gathered during the NBU inventory, MOAC identified significant spatial patterning in the distribution of certain types of sites from different archaeological periods across the project area. Data from sheep herder camps were used to reconstruct use of winter ranges by sheep for several decades.
West Tavaputs Plateau Programmatic Agreement
MOAC served as the proponent's primary consultants for the development of West Tavaputs Plateau Programmatic Agreement, which was touted as one of the most comprehensive and ground breaking agreements reached between developers, the federal government, and conservation organizations. In addition to writing significant portions of the agreement, MOAC is also responsible for fulfilling key requirements of the agreement, such as the yearly site monitoring and developing a predictive site location model to expedite future compliance efforts. MOAC provides yearly progress reports to the signatories and consulting parties on site monitoring, discoveries, and other aspects of the agreement.