The state said Evergreen is proposing to drill mineral core holes at seven possible locations to gather information on coal seams in the Mat-Su area. These holes are “for geological information only and do not involve dewatering the coal seams or gas production,” the state said.

The program is expected to last approximately eight weeks, beginning in December. Evergreen’s initial plans call for five core holes this winter.

Three of the locations, Kashwitna Lake, Willow Fishhook and Sheep Creek, require state plans of operations because they are on state-owned surface and subsurface.

Evergreen said its program will gather geologic information on coal seams in the Upper Cook Inlet and Eastern Susitna basins. “The purpose of the coring project is to gain geological information on the coal-bearing rock formations penetrated during the drilling, and to recover coal cores for further laboratory testing of their mineralogical, geological, and engineering properties,” Evergreen told the state.

Site preparation is expected to take a week or less at each location and coring each hole is expected to take one and a half to two weeks, with 24-hour per day operations.

One location is north of Palmer, the others are in the vicinity of the Parks Highway from northwest of Houston north to Sheep Creek, with one site northeast of Willow off the Willow Fishhook Road.