The Final End of the Pebble Mine?

Environmentalists have been fighting the Pebble Mine project near Bristol Bay, Alaska for nearly two decades.  They forced major mining companies to give up on the project, but a successor in interest has been doggedly pursuing the project through administration on both sides of the political divide.  The EPA issued a final determination this week under the Clean Water Act Section 404(c).  The agency determined that dumping mine wastes into the Bristol Bay watershed would have adverse impacts on the pristine salmon habitat of the watershed [see map]  The watershed contains a salmon spawning ground that supports a fishing industry worth $2 billion and employs 15,000 local people. Bristol Bay produces nearly half of the world's Sockeye salmon.

Without required permits, Northern Dynasty Minerals, a Canadian firm, is severely restricted to where they can dump thousands of tons of mine waste from the proposed open pit copper and gold mine. The compay is also appealing the denial by the Army Corp of Engineers in 2020 of its construction permits.  All of this opposition is making the project increasingly uneconomic despite the size of the mineral deposit

In addition to the latest regulatory victory, native peoples formed a corporation that granted conservation easements to more than 44,000 acres to protect them from future mine development in perpetuity.  EPA has used its Clean Water Act authority to block a project only three times in thirty years.  So despite the company's and Alaska's threat to sue the EPA over its final determination, the suit is unlikely to succeed.  Conservationists and tribes are breathing easier, but the zombie mine has come back before.  The minerals beneath the salmon are just too valuable to ignore.