HARRISBURG — The state Department of Environmental Protection on Tuesday announced it awarded a $1.66 million grant to the Clean Streams Foundation to maintain acid mine drainage treatment facilities in Butler, Cambria, Clarion and Venango counties.

The grant will allow the foundation to operate and maintain nine existing water treatment plants that remove acid mine drainage from nearby waterways, according to a news release from the DEP.

This includes costs incurred for water monitoring, treatment chemicals, system flushing, sludge removal and emergency repairs, among other things.

“It is important for us to fund facilities like these that are making a big impact on the water quality of our rivers and streams,” said DEP Secretary Christopher Abruzzo in the news release.

Collectively, these nine facilities treat nearly 1 million gallons of mine-influenced water daily.

The grant will be paid to the foundation over a period of five years. This is the second grant DEP has awarded to the foundation for the operation and maintenance of the treatment facilities.

In 2005, DEP entered into a consent order and agreement with C & K Coal Company to address post-mining issues, such as acid mine drainage. In that agreement, a trust fund was created by C & K to construct and operate treatment plants in impacted areas. The foundation was named as the trustee and is now responsible for the operation and maintenance of the treatment facilities.

Until the trust grows to cover all operation and maintenance costs for these treatment facilities, DEP will provide supplemental funding from the federal Surface Mining Conservation and Reclamation Fund.