As used in this sub-chapter, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise, the additional definitions apply:

(1) "Antiquities" means heritage properties or paleontological remains.

(2) "Department" means the Montana department of natural resources and conservation.

(3) "Effect" means a change in the integrity of location, design, materials, workmanship, feeling or association of an antiquity that contributes to its significance. The term includes isolation from or alteration of the surrounding environment, neglect of the property resulting in its deterioration or destruction, transfer or sale without adequate conditions or restrictions regarding preservation, maintenance or use, and destruction or alteration, either partial or total. For heritage properties only, the term includes introduction of visual, audible or atmospheric elements that are out of character with the property or alter its setting.

(4) "Emergency actions" include, but are not limited to:

(a) projects to repair or restore property or facilities damaged or destroyed as a result of a disaster when a disaster has been declared by the governor or other appropriate government entity;

(b) repairs to public service facilities necessary to maintain service; or

(c) projects, whether public or private, undertaken to prevent or mitigate immediate threats to public health, safety, welfare, or the environment.

(5) "Department action" means the department's decision to deny or approve an application for an easement, lease, or other certificate necessary for conducting activity upon or beneath the surface of state lands or under water on state lands if the approved activity will or might have an effect on antiquities or the department decision to proceed with an action that will or might have an effect on antiquities. "Department action" does not include decisions regarding a state mineral estate where the surface estate is not in state ownership.

(6) "Known antiquities" means antiquities on record with SHPO, the department, or the Montana statewide archeology files.

(7) "Heritage property" means any district, site, building, structure or object located upon or beneath the earth or under water that is significant in American history, architecture, archaeology or culture.

(8) "Paleontological remains" means fossilized plants and animals of a geological nature found upon or beneath the earth or under water which are rare and critical to scientific research.

(9) "SHPO" means the historic preservation office provided for in 2-15-1512, MCA.

(10) "Significant" as used in (7) above, means the quality in American history, architecture, archeology, or culture that is present in districts, sites, structures, or objects of state and local importance that possess integrity of location, design, setting, materials, workmanship, feeling, and association and:

(a) that are associated with events that have made a significant contribution to the broad patterns of our history;

(b) that are associated with the lives of persons significant in our past;

(c) that embody the distinctive characteristics of a type, period, or method of construction, or that represent the work of a master, or that possess high artistic values, or that represent a significant and distinguishable entity whose components may lack individual distinction; or

(d) that have yielded, or may be likely to yield, information important in prehistory or history.