(Such disasters have occurred in recent years in British Columbia and Brazil, with deadly consequences.) The Army Corps egregiously concludes that Pebble Mine would have no long-term impact on the “health of the commercial fisheries in Bristol Bay or Cook Inlet.” Although the draft environmental impact statement is far from a final decision, it greenlights multiple ways in which the mine’s construction can move forward.įor nearly a decade, Pebble Mine has spawned ongoing public outcry and protests from nearly every corner of the local community- indigenous Alaskan tribes, business leaders, fishermen, and conservationists.
It also limits the scope of its analysis-for example, by refusing to consider the potential environmental impacts of a tailings dam failure. Not so.Ĭalled “rushed and-at best-superficial” by NRDC’s Pebble Mine expert Taryn Kiekow Heimer, the review was completed in less than a year and ignores numerous concerns about the project’s potential impacts on the local ecology, economy, and traditional ways of life. You would think the Army Corps would take its time ensuring that a mine in the area would be environmentally sound. Army Corps of Engineers has released a woefully inadequate environmental review of Northern Dynasty Minerals’ proposal to build a massive open-pit gold and copper mine at the headwaters of Alaska’s nearly pristine Bristol Bay.Īs host to the most productive wild sockeye salmon run on earth, Bristol Bay sustains a $1.5 billion fishery that drives the economy of southwestern Alaska.
In an apparent attempt to rubber-stamp one of the most widely opposed mining projects in the world, the U.S.
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