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Mining Conflict and Opposition

Mary River mine at a standstill as hunters’ blockades enter 5th day – by Dustin Patar (Nunatsiaq News – February 8, 2021)

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A blockade of the Mary River iron mine continued into its fifth day, as a group of hunters opposed to the mine’s expansion demanded they be recognized as an Inuit association and be paid a portion of the royalties the mine generates.

“We would like to see actual negotiations with the most impacted communities and have us involved right away,” said Naymen Inuarak, one of the hunters currently at the Mary River mine site, in an interview via satellite phone. “We’ve been ignored way too long.”

Late last Thursday, a group of seven hunters from Arctic Bay and Pond Inlet arrived at the mine site and shut down the airstrip and road that leads to Milne Inlet, in protest of the mine’s Phase 2 expansion.

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Majority of Albertans opposed to expanded coal mining operations: poll – by Mark Villani (CTV News Calgary – February 8, 2021)

https://calgary.ctvnews.ca/

CALGARY — A new survey suggests that a significant number of Albertans are opposed to the provincial government’s move to allow expanded coal mining operations in the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains.

The latest poll, released Monday by public relations firm ThinkHQ, suggests that more than three-quarters of Albertans are aware of the issue.

Among the 1,140 people surveyed from Feb. 2 to Feb. 6, nearly seven-in-ten (69 per cent) oppose expanded development of the formerly protected areas of the province. The poll has a margin of error of +/- 2.9 percentage points.

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Proposal to Ban Big Mines Is Put to a Vote in Southern Ecuador – by Stephan Kueffner (Yahoo Finance/Bloomberg – February 4, 2021)

https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/

(Bloomberg) — Ecuador’s fledgling mining industry faces another test on Sunday when voters in the third-largest city will decide whether to ban major projects within municipal limits.

Alongside the country’s presidential and legislative elections, residents of Cuenca in the southern Andes mountains will be asked if they want large-scale mining within the drainage basins of five rivers.

While there are no big mines operating in the area yet, the referendum threatens to derail more than 40 concessions seeking to tap gold, silver and copper reserves.

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First Nations launch legal challenge to coal mining on Alberta’s Eastern Slopes – by Olivia Condon (Calgary Herald – February 4, 2021)

https://calgaryherald.com/

Siksika First Nation is launching a legal challenge against the province’s decision to rescind its coal policy, effectively allowing open-pit coal mining in the Rockies.

The coal policy, launched in 1976, aimed to protect parts of the Rocky Mountains from open-pit mining and designated the area, from Jasper to Waterton National Parks, into four categories.

Categories 1 and 2 restricted open pit mining, whereas categories 3 and 4 allowed it.

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Alberta promises close watch on new mines but cuts oversight of coal-polluted rivers – by Bob Weber (CTV News Edmonton – February 1, 2021)

https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/

Canadian Press – EDMONTON — Alberta government documents show repeated cuts to environmental monitoring despite contaminants in some waterways that exceed thresholds that are supposed to trigger increased scrutiny.

The province’s 2019 five-year monitoring plan shows stations on two rivers and a creek polluted with selenium from coal mines were mothballed. That was despite more than two decades of readings that Alberta Environment guidelines suggest should have led to closer attention.

The only station still operating is on the McLeod River about 200 kilometres downstream of the old Cheviot mine. The United Conservative government has pointed to “strict regulatory standards” in an increasingly heated debate over its plan to increase coal mining in the Rocky Mountains.

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Indigenous opposition to Arctic mine expansion could halt development – by Naill McGee (Globe and Mail – February 1, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

A proposed iron ore mine expansion by Baffinland Iron Mines Corporation is raising environmental red flags among Inuit groups, hamlets, and subsistence hunters and trappers, potentially putting the brakes on one of the biggest industrial developments ever envisaged in the Canadian Arctic.

Privately held Baffinland hopes to double its production of iron ore at its Baffin Island mine in Nunavut to 12 million tonnes a year, from six million tonnes.

The Oakville, Ont.-based miner also wants to build a railroad that would transport ore from its Mary River mine in the Qikiqtani region of North Baffin to Milne Port, about 100 kilometres away.

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Alberta faces backlash after move to scrap coal policy, ease restrictions on mining – by Emma Graney and Niall McGee (Globe and Mail – January 25, 2021)

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/

A 44-year-old coal and land protection policy – quietly killed by the Alberta government on the Friday afternoon before a long weekend last May – has led to a court challenge and a public backlash so strong the government has cancelled recently issued land leases for coal mining.

At the heart of the discontent is the United Conservative government’s decision to tear up the stringent 1976 Coal Policy, and the potential for more open-pit mining in the fragile land and crucial Alberta watersheds flanked by the Rocky Mountains.

The policy, introduced under Peter Lougheed, laid out how and where coal development could go ahead in the province. It banned open-pit mines over a large area by using land classifications, with completely or highly protected areas deemed categories 1 or 2.

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Alberta monolith comes with message to save Rocky Mountains from open-pit coal mining – by Colette Derworiz (CBC News Calagary/Canadian Press – January 15, 2021)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/

A towering stainless steel monolith set up along the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains in Alberta comes with a message.

The three-metre-tall structure, which reflects its surroundings, is one of many that have been found around the world in recent months. Monoliths have been discovered on a California trail, a Utah desert and at sites across Canada.

Many have popped up without explanation, but the woman who built the one in southern Alberta says she wanted to draw attention to the threats the area is facing as the province moves to open a vast stretch of the mountains to open-pit coal mining.

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Alaska to appeal Corps’ Pebble decision – by Shane Lasley (North of 60 Mining News – January 11, 2021)

https://www.miningnewsnorth.com/

Alaska officials say the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers neglected to follow its own guidance when setting mitigations measures for Pebble and the state is appealing Army Corps’ decision to deny federal permits required to develop a mine at the world-class metals deposit on state lands in Southwest Alaska.

“The flawed decision by the Alaska District creates a dangerous precedent that will undoubtedly harm Alaska’s future and, any potential project can fall victim to the same questionable standards,” said Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy.

“We have to prevent a federal agency, in this instance, the Alaska District of the Army Corps of Engineers, from using the regulatory process to effectively prevent the state from fulfilling a constitutional mandate to develop its natural resources.”

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‘I’m kind of pissed off’: Country star Corb Lund criticizes UCP for Alberta coal mining plan – by Sean Amato (CTV News Edmonton – Janaury 13, 2021)

https://edmonton.ctvnews.ca/

EDMONTON — Country star Corb Lund has released a new video, but this one isn’t a guitar song. It’s him criticizing a UCP government plan to allow “mountaintop removal” for coal exploration in western Alberta.

“We’ve all seen the foothills, it’s beautiful country. So I don’t really like this,” Lund said in a video posted to social media Tuesday. Lund said he’s been researching the issue since people started telling him about it in December.

He said he’s met with a number of people including provincial ministers, members of parliament, First Nations representatives and people who live and harvest food in the area.

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Native Americans seek to stop Rio Tinto, BHP copper mine plan – by Nick Toscano (Sydney Morning Herald – January 13, 2021)

https://www.smh.com.au/

Australian mining giants Rio Tinto and BHP are facing fresh opposition from Native American groups over a plan to build an enormous copper mine in Arizona in the United States.

Apache Stronghold, a non-profit group, has filed a lawsuit in the US District Court in Phoenix to stop the US government from transferring a 980-hectare parcel of land at Oak Flat, Arizona, to the mining giants’ joint venture, Resolution Copper.

Resolution, which is 55 per cent owned by Rio Tinto and 45 per cent owned by rival BHP, says its proposed copper mine has the potential to supply nearly 25 per cent of US copper demand for 40 years.

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How a retired Indian professor took on a mining giant – and won (AlJazeera – January 7, 2021)

https://www.aljazeera.com/

Thoothukudi, India – She spearheaded a decades-long campaign against a copper smelter over alleged environmental contamination in the south Indian seaside town of Thoothukudi.

Sterlite Copper, the Indian subsidiary of Vedanta Resources, a global mining and metals conglomerate, was forced to shut its plant in 2018, thanks to a sustained and spirited fight led by 67-year-old teacher-turned activist Fatima Babu.

The plant’s shuttering, said Fatima, “has boosted the morale of the townspeople, which is a very very big thing for us”. “But we would want Sterlite to pay for the damage it has done.”

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Alberta ranchers resist plans to ease coal mining rules – by Doug Ferguson (The Western Producer – January 7, 2021)

https://www.producer.com/

Several Alberta ranchers and First Nations have launched legal bids to put a halt to a provincial decision easing the development of open-pit coal mines on the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains.

The ranchers fear it will not only harm their cattle operations near the headwaters of the Oldman River but also risk polluting water used downstream by farmers and communities, such as Lethbridge and as far east as Saskatchewan.

“(The headwaters) just supply really pure, clean water, and once they destroy that, we can never get it back,” said Mac Blades of the Rocking P Ranch near Nanton, Alta. “There is no reclaiming an open-pit mine.”

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Wolf Lake defenders, mining company at odds – by Jim Moodie (Sudbury Star – December 17, 2020)

https://www.thesudburystar.com/

Renewed probing for gold and other minerals at Wolf Lake could begin as early as this month. “The plan is to drill in January but it’s possible we could get going before the holidays,” said Stefan Spears, CEO of Inventus Mining. “We don’t have a specific date, but I’d like to get started as soon as we can.”

The winter exploration work is part of a broader hunt for deposits in the Chiniguchi-Temagami region that the junior miner, which is headquartered in Toronto but counts an office off Falconbridge Road, has dubbed its Sudbury 2.0 Project.

The premise is this relatively untapped area, similar in scope and magnetic signature to the Sudbury basin, could duplicate — or rival, at any rate — the mining camp that built the Nickel City.

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A Copper Mine vs. Sacred Apache Land: The Story in Words and Images – by Eliza Griswold (New York Times – November 17, 2020)

https://www.nytimes.com/

OAK FLAT: A Fight for Sacred Land in the American West – by Lauren Redniss

Naelyn Pike, a skateboard aficionado and teenage Apache activist, arrived in Washington in 2013 to testify before Congress. When she passed through the metal detector in the Capitol, the tin jingles on her traditional dress set off the alarm.

She was speaking that day to a Senate subcommittee about the fate of Oak Flat, a vast plot of southeastern Arizona that is sacred to the San Carlos Apaches and lies above one of the largest known untapped veins of copper in the United States.

Since 2005, members of the San Carlos Apache tribe have been battling both a mining company and the federal government to keep the copper untouched. Not only would building the mine entail the collapse, or subsidence, of the tribe’s ceremonial land, but since the group’s spiritual identity is tied to that land, its members viewed the prospective demise of Oak Flat as a larger act of erasure and a violation of their religious freedom.

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