In southwestern Alaska, it’s all about the fish. Even though my “boys” have yet to bring home a fish for dinner, many Alaskans subsist on it. And for those that don’t rely on their daily catch to feed them throughout the year, they rely on a healthy fishing industry to make a living.
Alaska provides 92% of the world’s Salmon. Bristol Bay is the largest thriving sockeye salmon fishery in the world and supplies 51% of the salmon Alaska produces.
Wild salmon no longer exist on the east coast of the Unites States and salmon runs on the west coast are near extinction. So, why is Bristol Bay thriving? Because it’s habitat, ecosystems and food chains are undisturbed.
Multinational mining companies (Rio Tinto, Anglo American and Northern Dynasty Minerals) are proposing to put in the largest open pit mine in the world at the headwaters of the Bristol Bay watershed. This, Pebble Mine Project, is surrounded by 1,000 square miles of additional mining claims and 1,800 more square miles federal lands – a potential mining area more than 50% larger than the grand Canyon National Park. If the Pebble Mine is approved, it will set the precedent for all of the potential mining territory to fall prey.
Anders Gustafson, Executive Director of the Renewable Resources Foundation, reviewed the history’s of the mining company’s previous and ongoing mine projects and found that every single one had a detrimental impact on the environment.
This project includes building the largest dam in the world (in an earthquake active area)to “contain” toxic waste that the mine will produce that equals twice the area of Manhattan and to the 70th floor. The impact of such a project would certainly disrupt the fragile ecosystem that has allowed the salmon to thrive and potentially decimate the salmon entirely.
It’s a classic case of big business vs. “the little guy”. I can’t begin to know or understand the politics involved that would even allow a project like this to be considered in the first place but, it happens and it is happening here, right now. (Are you shaking your head too?)
The percent of copper and gold to be mined is extremely low which means that in order to make the project profitable, the mine needs to be gigantic. The mining companies are also asking the State of Alaska to provide and pay for all of the infrastructure needed to develop the mine. What Alaska gets in return is a giant hole in the ground to be managed as a toxic waste site for several hundred years to come and the destruction of an extremely valuable, renewable resource and industry that has thrived for over a hundred years and has sustained people in the region for 1000’s of years.
No matter which way you look at it, it’s a bad idea. A really bad idea. And, as Robert Redford recently stated in the New York Times it’s “an environmental tragedy waiting to happen”.
I don’t fish. I also don’t live in Alaska and depend upon the fishing industry for my livelihood. But, many people do. And, after only a few weeks, the place has made a special place in my heart.
I am glad Anders Gustafson organized the Salmonstock Festival so that I could learn about and join in their fight to keep one of the world’s most amazing places wild, pristine and thriving for generations to come.
The earth we abuse and the living things we kill will, in the end, take their revenge; for in exploiting their presence we are diminishing our future. ~Marya Mannes, More in Anger, 1958
To find out more about the Pebble Mine Project or help support the Renewable Resources Foundation contact:
www.nopebblemine.org
www.renewableresourcesfoundation.org
To learn more about Bristol Bay:
Hidden Alaska: Bristol Bay and Beyond – Dave Atcheson and Michael Melford *available at bookstores