The nonferrous mining debate is raging across the
Northland with people voicing opinions from all sides. The University of
Minnesota-Duluth (UMD)
Center for Ethics and Public
Policy hosted a panel discussion of the issue on April
9, 2013, with five panelists representing a variety of viewpoints.
On February 15, 1975,
UMD held a symposium on copper nickel mining.
Dr. Thomas Bacig implored participants to treat each yother “as human beings of reasonably good intention g trying to find the best solutions to problems we encounter.” This seemed to hbe the case at this gathering l38 years later. tWords from the state
Minnesota Department nof Natural Resources
(DNR) Commissioner Tom
Landwehr was the first panelist t to speak. He talked about how the legislative, executive (of which the
DNR is part) and judicial kbranches of government kwork together to manage dthe land. He said he believes AMinnesota’s environmental regulations are good.
Landwehr explained dthat the state sold half of the d12 million acres of School
Trust Land it was allotted by the federal government in the 1800s but retained mineral rights to all 12 million acres. He referred to the state’s mineral policy,
Minnesota Statute 93.001, which states, “It is the policy of the state to provide for the diversification of the state’s mineral economy through long-term support of mineral exploration, evaluation, environmental research, development, production, and commercialization.”
Any mining project must include health safeguards and result in reclamation of the land, Landwehr said.
He pointed out that while exploratory core sampling is taking places in numerous places, only a small percentage of it will result in mining operations. Companies wanting to open mines must go through the environmental review process and have insurance that would take care of any environmental damage.
Environmental concerns
The next to speak was Friends of the BWCA Policy Director Betsy Daub. The Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW) is the nation’s most popular wilderness, she said, and the proposed PolyMet and Twin Metals mining operations are in the Lake Superior and BWCAW watersheds.
Because of the risks, Daub said, “we need a high level of confidence that these projects can be done right.” She suggested four “cracks” in the “foundations of confidence”: 1. The track record of nonferrous mines is not good. Daub said one study showed 89 percent of mines that predicted no acid mine drainage have had acid mine drainage anyway, with cleanup costs passed on to states and citizens because the companies have lacked financial ability to clean up the pollution or have gone bankrupt. 2. PolyMet’s first proposal did not pass the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) standards, although it had been approved by the state. 3. The Minnesota government has failed to protect against water pollution in previous mining projects such as the Dunca Pit and Spruce Road projects.
Daub said the legislature needs to improve financial assurance regulations. 4. Allegations of environmental degradation and human rights violations have been waged against companies involved in the proposed mining projects: Glencore, the major investor in the proposed PolyMet project, and Duluth Metals (a Canadian firm) and Antofagasta (a Chilean firm), investors in the proposed Twin Metals projects.
Daub said the consultant Twin Metals has hired is the same consultant that oversaw the I-35 bridge that collapsed in Minneapolis.
University researcher weighs in
The University of Minnesota has done a lot of research on mining, partly thanks to funding that comes from mining company profits. The economic potential of nonferrous mining in northeastern Minnesota is enormous, said U of M Center for Applied Research & Technology Development Director Don Fosnacht, and could even rival the iron ore industry.
About 1.2 billion years ago, this land was a tropical paradise near the equator, Fosnacht said. A lot of geological processes contributed to the creation of the minerals here.
The ore in the Duluth Complex is low in metallic sulfides compared to that in Wisconsin, Fosnacht said. The amount of sulfur in a lot of the metals found in other places including Wisconsin ranges from 20 to 34 percent, but in Minnesota’s Duluth complex, it ranges from .4 to 1.4 percent.
Sulfides become sulfate when nonferrous rock meets both water and air. A sulfate can be converted back into a sulfide. After the first step in the process, Fosnacht said, nonferrous tailings contain about 5 percent of the sulfur the original rock had. The latest technology is to extract the metals by autoclaving, which uses high pressure at a low temperature. Sulfur is actually used as an energy source and can be turned into gypsum, a building material.
Various techniques have been created to remove sulfates, Fosnacht said, including chemical treatments, biological filtering, reverse osmosis, and ion exchange. “It’s a matter of cost and the reliability of systems,” he said.
At the Flambeau reclamation site in Ladysmith, Wisconsin, Fosnacht said, sulfate levels have been below the wild rice standard of 10 parts per million for the last 10 years.
Fosnacht stated that nonferrous mining can be done without harm to the environment.
A mining representative speaks
Twin Metals Minnesota Vice President of Government & Public Affairs Bob McFarlin talked about the underground copper and nickel mining his company is proposing.
The Duluth Complex in Minnesota contains what has been estimated at more than four billion tons of “strategic metal resources,” McFarlin said. Minnesota holds 99 percent of the nickel, 89 percent of the cobalt, and 90 percent of the iron within the U.S.
The proposed projects overlap with already existing mining areas, Fosnacht said. He believes the resources would take a century to extract. The process of bringing a mine to fruition is long and complicated, and the companies pursuing them are still in the prefeasibility stage.
Fosnacht said while the average wage in Minnesota is $47,000/year, the average mining job pays $72,000/ year.
“Twin Metals has a very strong environmental commitment,” said Fosnacht. All projects like the ones Twin Metals is proposing go through lengthy, rigorous review by multiple agencies, he said. All possible environmental impacts are studied. The projects have extensive governmental oversight. Many permits and approvals are required along the way.
The Tribe’s concerns
The proposed mines are upstream of Fond du Lac and within the 1854 Treaty area which also covers Grand Portage and Bois Forte, said Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Water Projects Coordinator Nancy Schuldt. The Native people have in perpetuity the right to hunt, gather, and fish the resources within the Treaty area. The Treaty was intended to enable traditional practices and provide sustenance to Native peoples, she said, and in addition, the federal government has given the Tribe regulatory authority over the river at Fond du Lac.
“We are not opposed to mining,” Schuldt said. Fond du Lack has no illusions that mining will cease. Their goal, she said, is to see that all government regulations are followed.
Schuldt showed a map of the waterways that the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency has put on the impaired waters list in the Arrowhead Region. Mining processes use a lot of water and discharge it back into the watershed, she said, and the water is not always returned to the watershed it came from.
Issues of particular concern to the Tribe are the cumulative impacts of mining, including cultural impacts, a decrease in wild rice habitat, and loss of access to treaty resources.
Lake Superior is a worldclass resource, Schuldt said, and so is the land where the mining is proposed.
This is the first in a twopart series on a panel discussion that took place at the University of Minnesota-Duluth on April 9 regarding proposed nonferrous mining projects in northeastern Minnesota.
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