Wrangell Cooperative Association added its voice to the chorus of people concerned about Canadian mining concerns developing upstream of shared rivers.
The forum was a hearing held by the Alaska House Fisheries Special Committee in Juneau on October 12. Testimony was collected from around the state, with speakers calling in even from as far away as Arizona.
The issue at hand is a collection of large scale mines either operating or in development, located in the watersheds of the Stikine, Unuk and Taku rivers. For Wrangell, the Red Chris mine is the latest large-scale operation to begin production. Located 11 miles from the headwaters of the Stikine River, the open-pit copper and gold mine began full-scale operations late last year.
Concerns about the mine’s environmental impact on the river were heightened by an incident in Canada in August 2014, when a tailings dam servicing the Mount Polley mine ruptured. Billions of gallons of metals-tainted effluent were released into waters that fed into the salmon-rich Fraser River system, disrupting subsistence activities for the area’s inhabitants.
The special committee meeting follows continued developments at the state and national levels. Earlier this month, Alaska Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott signed a statement of cooperation with British Columbia provincial counterparts, outlining a commitment to greater communication between the two governments and setting in motion creation of a bilateral working group focused on transboundary river issues. The group will include as members state commissioners and provincial deputy ministers, and will facilitate existing cooperative efforts, exchange information on existing and planned mining concerns, and aim to improve reporting of imminent or actual release of pollutants which could affect shared waters.
Speaking during last week’s committee hearing, President Richard Peterson of Tlingit Haida Central Council noted the SOC was nonbinding.
“I think that’s a great first step, but I think it needs improvement,” he said.
What Peterson and other advocates of maintaining river quality have recommended is involvement of the International Joint Commission, a body established by the Boundary Waters Treaty of 1909 which oversees areas where shared resources between the U.S. and Canada are a concern. The IJC would provide a more formal framework for avoiding and resolving transboundary disputes in a bilateral fashion.
The state’s Congressional delegation since last year has been pushing the State Department to, among other measures, look into engaging the IJC mechanism. Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s office reported it received a formal response on October 6. The letter was affirmative, if inconclusive.
“It is promising to see the State Department show an elevated interest in this topic, as demonstrated by recent trips to the state to meet with concerned Alaskans,” Murkowski commented in a release. “That being said, I remain disappointed that the State Department refuses to address our questions and suggestions, such as to consider appointing a special representative for U.S.-Canada transboundary issues. And it is unacceptable that Secretary Kerry has yet to meet directly with Alaskans on such a hugely important issue. The State Department’s response is a step in the right direction, but we still have a long way to go until Alaskans’ concerns are adequately addressed.”
A pair of revealing reports looking into the current state and potential risks of the mines were highlighted during the hearing. The Center for Science in Public Participation published a report cataloguing tailings dam failures globally from 1915 to the present. The full report is available to read at http://www.csp2.org/technical-reports, but a synopsis given during last week’s hearing conveyed some of the main points.
What the group concluded was that there has been an overall dropoff in the number of tailings dam failures since 1995, but that the number of serious breaches have continued on a linear trend. Troublingly, it further found that this look at the issue was unique, and that there were limitations in oversight of the structures beyond the regional level.
“Nobody, unfortunately, is looking at this,” testified Dr. Dave Chambers, founder and president of CSP2.
Chambers reported tailings dams also have a tendency to fail more frequently than those built to retain water, up to 10 times as often.
“From a technical standpoint, there’s no reason for this,” he told the House committee. Chambers pointed to economic considerations which contribute to substandard design, often built and operated by companies under financial stress, whose interest is in raising production to offset low commodities prices.
“Today, clearly economics drive design rather than safety,” he concluded.
Kirsten Shelton of the McDowell Group shared findings from an economic impact report she had helped prepare on Southeast Alaska Transboundary Watersheds. Available to review at http://www.mcdowellgroup.net/publications/, the report found the three major rivers account for $48 million in economic activity each year, and that their combined value nears $950,000,000 over 30 years. However, Shelton reminded committee members to think of these river systems as part of a whole, not easily accountable by their material value.
“We did not measure intrinsic value,” she noted.
That maintaining the waters is not merely a matter of economics or resources was made clear by other speakers at the hearing.
“No amount of money brings back the dead,” testified Fred Olson Jr., chair of United Tribal Transboundary Mining Work Group. “It’s not about fish, or eating calories. It’s about this fish, from this place, prepared in a certain manner,” he explained. “This is our way of life.”
“I’ve been on this earth 60 years. From the time I was a little child, we worked on salmon. Salmon sustained us,” said Joel Jackson, vice president of the Organized Village of Kake. “We depend on that clean water to live.”
Speaking for Wrangell Cooperative Association, Aaron Angerman pointed out the community was never contacted or consulted by Imperial Metals when it began construction of the Red Chris Mine upriver of the Stikine. Wrangell, he said, was “assuming all the risk without seeing any of the benefits.”
“Our community can’t afford a mistake,” Angerman continued. “A complete tailings failure would be a disaster.”
Other speakers represented commercial fishing interests, rural subsistence users, environmental perspectives, and individual residents concerned about quality of life.
One testifier put on their eight year old son Elias with a simple message to the House committee: “When I grow up, I want to be able to fish.”
“We need this issue to be taken up by the International Joint Commission. You’ve got to get a binding agreement in writing,” admonished Bev Sellars, chair of First Nations Women Advocating Responsible Mining. Sellars testified she had not been eating salmon from the Fraser River even before the Mt. Polley breach. For 15 years she had abstained from it due to pollution, and the loss of the fish was more deeply troubling.
“That’s also a loss of our culture, my grandchildren aren’t going to know,” she said.
At the meeting’s end, committee members expressed confidence the hearing was a step in the right direction.
“It’s been brought to light and I’m confident this will not be the first hearing this committee will hear on this issue,” said committee chair Rep. Louise Stutes (R-Kodiak).
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