Is copper-nickel mining in Minnesota responsible? Not so's we can tell!

Copper-nickel mine proposers would have us believe that Minnesota's requirements are world class. We've been posting about sustainable mining, or responsible mining, or green mining, for several years. We have, based on what we've read, major doubts about the "world classness" of what's being proposed to be issued permits to mine in Minnesota. Today, we're going to list key points from a definition of responsible mining, as found in the late Robert Goodland's Responsible Mining:The Key to Profitable Resource Development-Defining “Best Practice Responsible Mining."

would it be responsible to mine near here?

Photo by J. Harrington

Goodland asserts that there are eight principles to responsible mining:

Principle 1: Social and Environmental Assessment
An objective, skilled assessment team is the starting point to determine the path toward responsible mining.

Principle 2: Transparency vs. Secrecy
No social and environmental assessment should be kept secret from potentially impacted stakeholders.

Principle 3: Acceptance by Stakeholders
If stakeholders don’t want the proposed project, it should not go ahead.

Principle 4: Food Production Trumps Questionable Mining
Mining must not decrease resources in areas of scarce land or water.

Principle 5: Compliance with International Standards
Responsible mining corporations will uphold all international social and environmental agreements.

Principle 6: Prequalification or certification of potential mining permit seekers
The best practice is for all mines to engage in a rigorous independent certification regime, as suggested in the IUCN World Conservation Congress’ Resolution 4.088.

Principle 7: Insurance and Performance Bonds
Insurance and performance bonds, mechanisms to foster compliance with contractual obligations and to improve the quality of results, should become standard in mining.

Principle 8: Royalties, Taxes and Fees
Responsible mining accurately assesses all relevant costs and benefits to ascertain whether the proposed mine will earn a significant net benefit.

We believe that, at best, Minnesota would rate about a gentle person's "C" on the preceding principles. Woodland then proceeds to consider that "Five types of socially or environmentally sensitive areas need special consideration in mining regulations." We are unaware of provisions in Minnesota's mining regulations that create what Goodland refers to as "No-Go Zones for Mining:" (something Minnesota probably needs)

• Indigenous Peoples Reserves:


• Conflict Zones:


• Fragile Watersheds:


• Biodiversity, Habitats, and Wildlands:


• Cultural Property:

is it responsible to expand a tailings dam upstream of this state park?

Photo by J. Harrington

We further believe Minnesota, and those who would undertake copper-nickel mining here, would be well served if each mining proposal were reviewed by third party auditors to determine just how responsible the proposed mining project may be. From what we've read so far, we doubt any would pass muster. Read Goodland's paper and the assertions by those proposing to undertake copper-nickel mining. Form your own opinion. We'd sleep much better at night if we were proven in error in our assessments of the status of "responsible mining" in Minnesota.

                     We Are Not Responsible

By Harryette Mullen

We are not responsible for your lost or stolen relatives. 

We cannot guarantee your safety if you disobey our instructions. 

We do not endorse the causes or claims of people begging for handouts. 

We reserve the right to refuse service to anyone. 

Your ticket does not guarantee that we will honor your reservations. 

In order to facilitate our procedures, please limit your carrying on. 

Before taking off, please extinguish all smoldering resentments. 

If you cannot understand English, you will be moved out of the way. 

In the event of a loss, you’d better look out for yourself. 

Your insurance was cancelled because we can no longer handle

your frightful claims. Our handlers lost your luggage and we

are unable to find the key to your legal case. 

You were detained for interrogation because you fit the profile. 

You are not presumed to be innocent if the police 

have reason to suspect you are carrying a concealed wallet. 

It’s not our fault you were born wearing a gang color. 

It is not our obligation to inform you of your rights. 

Step aside, please, while our officer inspects your bad attitude. 

You have no rights we are bound to respect. 

Please remain calm, or we can’t be held responsible 

for what happens to you. 

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Do Minnesota's rules need a ruler?

I spent part of yesterday afternoon and evening reading the Appeals Court Decision on the PolyMet NorthMet project. In the process, I learned that I have been technically incorrect that Minnesota doesn't have areas where mining is, by regulation, prohibited. I don't know how I could have missed it. There are numerous rules sections under the heading of the Department of Natural Resources. Four appear to have to do with mining:

6125	MINERAL RESOURCES
6130	FERROUS METALLIC MINERAL MINING
6131	PEAT MINING
6132	NONFERROUS METALLIC MINERAL MINING

Under 6125, Mineral Resources, there are three major sections:

PERMITS AND LEASES FOR METALLIC MINERALS, EXCEPT
IRON ORES AND TACONITE ORES

PERMITS AND LEASES FOR SAND AND GRAVEL 

LEASES OF STATE LANDS
FOR SELECTED INDUSTRIAL MINERALS

There's no metallic mineral mining exclusion that we could find in these sections.

The PolyMet NorthMet project doesn't involve ferrous metallic mineral or peat mining so we shouldn't have to look there. That leaves 6132 Nonferrous metallic mineral mining. It has four general sections:

GENERAL PROVISIONS

PERMIT REQUIREMENTS

RECLAMATION STANDARDS

ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES

Logic might suggest one would expect to find areas from which mining is excluded under either General Provisions or Permit Requirements. Don't bother looking there. The pertinent sections are located as part of Reclamation Standards. (Because, of course, reclamation wouldn't be necessary in areas where mining is excluded?) Here's the relevant listing:

6132.2000 SITING. 

Subpart 1. Goals.     Mining shall be conducted on sites that minimize adverse impacts on natural resources and the public. Separations shall be maintained between mining areas and adjacent conflicting land uses. All sites shall incorporate setbacks or separations that are needed to comply with air, water, and noise pollution standards; local land use regulations; and requirements of other appropriate authorities.
§
Subp. 2. Mining excluded.     Except as allowed under state and federal laws, no mining shall be conducted within the following:
A. the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, as legally described in the Federal Register, volume 45, number 67 (April 4, 1980), with state restrictions specified in Minnesota Statutes, section 84.523, subdivision 3;
B. Voyageurs National Park, with state restrictions specified in Minnesota Statutes, section 84B.03, subdivision 1;
C. state wilderness areas, with restrictions specified in Minnesota Statutes, section 86A.05, subdivision 6;
D. Agassiz and Tamarac National Wilderness areas, and Pipestone and Grand Portage National monuments;
E. state scientific and natural areas;
F. within state peatland scientific and natural areas where such activities would significantly modify or alter the peatland water levels or flows, peatland water chemistry, plant or animal species or communities, or natural features of the peatland scientific and natural areas, except in the event of a national emergency declared by Congress;
G. calcareous fens identified in Minnesota Statutes, section 103G.223; and
H. a state park, except if the park has been established as a result of its association with mining.

would you locate a mine and tailings basin upstream?

Photo by J. Harrington

There's also a prohibition on mining that disturbs the surface within a quarter mile of many of the preceding areas and

within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness Mineral Management Corridor, identified on the Department of Natural Resources map entitled "Minnesota Department of Natural Resources B.W.C.A.W. Mineral Management Corridor," dated February 1991, which map is hereby incorporated by reference, is not subject to frequent change, and is available through the State Law Library;

We found nothing that acknowledges that mining rarely, if ever, occurs without water resources. Presumably, water quality impacts would never leave the site? Or, it's not DNR's worry, that headache belongs to the Pollution Control Agency? In any case, we believe that the approach, logic, and structure used by the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance makes lots more sense than the fragmented structure Minnesota has cobbled together.

School

By Daniel J. Langton

I was sent home the first day

with a note: Danny needs a ruler.

My father nodded, nothing seemed so apt.

School is for rules, countries need rulers,

graphs need graphing, the world is straight ahead.

It had metrics one side, inches the other.

You could see where it started

and why it stopped, a foot along,

how it ruled the flighty pen,

which petered out sideways when you dreamt.

I could have learned a lot,

understood latitude, or the border with Canada,

so stern compared to the South

and its unruly river with two names.

But that first day, meandering home, I dropped it.

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Can Minnesota make "green" mining work?

If one pokes about the Internet long enough, some fascinating information can be uncovered. This morning I was doing some poking trying to learn more about the relationship between mining and rural economic and community development. I keep reading that Minnesota's Iron Range needs taconite mining and, probably, sulfide mining to provide jobs. I also agree with Aaron Brown's perspective that the Iron Range economy needs diversification.

northern Minnesota

Photo by J. Harrington

Before we get to the potentially good news, let's see if we can establish the following as framing the issues:

1. At some point, all economically viable minerals will have been extracted from available ore. Mining jobs will then be nonexistant.
2. Minnesota has been unsuccessful at developing much in the way of value-added mining employment (see Essar steel). 
3. The value of ore and the availability of employment is dependent on global markets and the international economy, both of which suffer boom and bust cycles.
4. If Minnesota's environmental regulations make metals produced in Minnesota economically non-competitive, mines and jobs are unlikely to be forthcoming.
5. Iron Rangers are unlikely to all move away and international mining corporations are unlikely to forgo resources available in Minnesota.
6. Mining in northern Minnesota has done little so far to help create a diversified economy.

Other countries and other places in the United States face similar issues when it comes to mining's contributions to development of local economies. (Remember a famous quotation about "that sucking sound you hear?" It's the jobs leaving when the resource is depleted.) So, are there potential solutions? Based on what I found this morning, I'd venture a definite Maybe. Here are leads to what I think are two pieces of the puzzle that have thus far been missing.

• Community Benefit Agreements as a condition of an annually renewable mining license. (I believe Minnesota has some experience with such agreements in relation to stadia and LRT lines.)
• Some interesting work done at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on environmentally sensitive mining. One of their points is the need to improve international regulation of mining.

I also think Minnesota should, if we haven't already, give strong consideration to augmenting our financial assurance requirements with specific criteria that any mining licensee have an appropriate to the risk minimum net worth as a condition of issuance and renewal of a mining license. This might help reduce problems from underfunded or undercapitalized mining corporations doing business in Minnesota. (Although, in a world where Catholic Archdioceses file for bankruptcy, it's hard to envision anything that looks like real long term financial assurance.)

There's an old saying to the effect that "when the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail." I think Minnesotans are absolutely right to be extremely concerned about the potential environmental devastation mining may deliver to the northern part of the state, with little in the way of long term benefits. I also think that we have not yet used all the tools available to address that issue (those issues), nor have we put mining in Minnesota in a proper 21st century regulatory and economic framework to protect and enhance our environment, economy and long term sustainability. Today would be the second best time to start. It's already too late to start at what would have been the best time. Will Minnesota take this opportunity to become an international leader in "green" mining?

My Geology

Sheila Packa

I excavate these words from a vein of iron
from stones broken
beneath old growth
from the open pit – lit by dynamite
by men whose lives are punctuated by midnights
who drive new cars to the plant,
to the Crusher and Agglomerator,
and later suffer mesothelioma.
I drive in acid rain
my compass gone awry
over Proterozoic layers with four wheel drive.
These words are test drills and core samples
from the Boundary Waters.
These words are wrung from the whistles
and wheels that turn.
These words have never been projected
into board rooms.
I have yet to wield these powers or capitalize.
I have yet to see the returns.
I claim my words from the broken
English, damaged roots,
Finnish syntax and geomagnetic fields,
from Eminent Domain
and small print, unreadable clauses.
I find my vowels
from labor contracts and mine dumps
factories and invisible contamination.
My words, in the run off
in open streams – oxidize
form like tree rings
in industrial circles
heat in the smelters, pour like lava into steel
form these rails that carry the trains
these trains that carry this freight.

********************************************
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Would IRMA ban mining in BWCA?

If you read yesterday's posting, you probably remember that IRMA is the acronym for the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance, which is developing a Standard for Responsible Mining. (Even if you didn't read yesterday's posting, you now know what IRMA is an acronym for.) A draft of Version 2.0 of the Standard was released today for public comment. By reference the Standard incorporates a world-wide database of areas protected from mining, which includes the Boundary Waters Canoe Area as a site classified IUCN Category Ib. One of the relevant elements of the Standard in the Environmental Responsibility section addresses such Highly Protected Areas. It notes, inter alia:

3.7.2.1. Mining-related activities shall not take place in the following Highly Protected Areas (HPA):...

• IUCN category I -III protected areas

Sawtooth Mountains, northern Minnesota

Photo by J. Harrington

I am not a lawyer, but it seems to me that a site listed and categorized as Ib most likely falls somewhere between category I and category III and therefore "mining-related activities shall not take place" there. Governor Dayton's and, hopefully, the federal government's, rejection of the Twin Metals proposed project looks to me as if it's consistent with and supported by this part of the Standard. In fact, a quick skim of the Protected Areas section seems to make it pretty clear that mining should not even be allowed in a "buffer area" next to the BWCA.

What is much less clear to me is whether any of Minnesota's environmental, mining or mine permitting agencies are even discussing the potential relevance of IRMA's draft Standards to mining decisions and activities in Minnesota. What I think I've seen so far has been very much a "throw it all at the wall and see what sticks" strategy from both the pro- and anti- mining advocates. On the other hand, each week many more in the business sector are recognizing the benefits of "green building" and "greening supply chains" and "sustainable business" and "Corporate Social Responsibility." As I see it, Minnesotans can continue to battle the old battles in a win-lose framework that will shift with political power, or we can use new systems approaches to build a new economy for Minnesota by making our supply sources more sustainable. I've found no indication that Mining Minnesota is even aware of IRMA, despite claims to environmentally responsible mining. The Tiffany Foundation provided a $50,000 grant to Minnesota Environmental Partnership back in 2012, for "Support to create and promote a model for responsible, non-polluting sulfide mining in Minnesota." I'm trying to learn if there were productive results from that effort. Again, I see no hopeful signs.

Let me be clear, I'm appalled at mining's environmental and social track record. I don't believe that existing systems offer us much assurance that environmental disasters from mining activities can be avoided. See Brazil and Mt. Polley for recent examples. I doubt very much that we're going to successfully recycle enough rare earths and strategic metals to continue to support our dependence on electronic trinkets and useful gadgets such as the one I'm typing this on. So I've reached the working conclusion we need to change our practices and values to optimize the environmental and social benefits of an essentially damaging activity. We won't get there if we do all our talking through lawyers. IRMA's Standards seem to offer a reasonable alternative starting place for more productive talks. Why aren't more Minnesotans talking about them?

To answer the question that started this post, remembering INAL (I'm not a lawyer), I believe IRMA would ban mining in the BWCA. I also believe Minnesota could be dismally laggard for not requiring all future mining permits to reference whatever is the current version of the Standard as a permit requirement.

The Dependencies

By Howard Nemerov

This morning, between two branches of a tree   

Beside the door, epeira once again

Has spun and signed his tapestry and trap.   

I test his early-warning system and

It works, he scrambles forth in sable with   

The yellow hieroglyph that no one knows   

The meaning of. And I remember now

How yesterday at dusk the nighthawks came   

Back as they do about this time each year,

Grey squadrons with the slashes white on wings   

Cruising for bugs beneath the bellied cloud.   

Now soon the monarchs will be drifting south,   

And then the geese will go, and then one day   

The little garden birds will not be here.   

See how many leaves already have

Withered and turned; a few have fallen, too.   

Change is continuous on the seamless web,   

Yet moments come like this one, when you feel   

Upon your heart a signal to attend

The definite announcement of an end

Where one thing ceases and another starts;   

When like the spider waiting on the web   

You know the intricate dependencies   

Spreading in secret through the fabric vast   

Of heaven and earth, sending their messages   

Ciphered in chemistry to all the kinds,

The whisper down the bloodstream: it is time.

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On the other hand -- UN SDGs and mining

I think it was Harry Truman who used to say he was looking for one-armed economists, so they couldn't say "one the one hand, ... on the other hand." I have a similar reaction to the prospect of copper mining in Minnesota. One the one hand, I absolutely don't want to see it happen. One the other hand, I fear our government's ability to show enough common sense to say "No, it's not worth it." I used to know a joke about the fellow in a small town who lost money every week in a Friday night poker game. When asked why he continued to play in an obviously crooked game, he replied "but it's the only game in town."

iron mining tailings mound, northern Minnesota

Photo by J. Harrington

If Minnesota does allow copper mining, I'd like to see us attain maximum local benefits with minimal negative impacts. Are you old enough to remember Bing Crosby's version of "Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate the Positive?" Well, the Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment, the Sustainable Development Solutions Network, UNDP and the World Economic Forum have released an Executive Summary draft of Mapping Mining to the Sustainable Development Goals: A Preliminary Atlas. It lists as the first key finding:

Mining impacts all 17 SDGs, to varying degrees, across a wide range of issue areas that present both challenges and opportunities. Challenges require mitigating the negative impacts of mining; opportunities require enhancing the positive impacts of mining. The specific opportunities and implications of the SDGs, targets, and actions will differ depending on company strategy, commodity, location, mine cycle stage, and legacy.

If Minnesota is unwise enough to permit copper mining, allowing it only within the context of increasing the state's sustainable development makes the most sense to me. Reading through the draft, I think there are a number of missed opportunities created by the way we've gone about regulating mining in the past, up to today. The world in which Minnesota and mining exist is far, far different that the world in which mining started here and Minnesota became a state. We're past time for a major adjustment and that, I believe, involves more than adequate financial assurance. Here's a quick for instance: how much cooperation and collaboration occurs between local and state government, mining operations and utilities to maximize minings role in infrastructure development, things like renewable energy and broadband? I suspect not enough but I don't know. To quote, again, from the draft report:

"...there is a strong and proven business case for companies to contribute to the realization of each SDG.

"This is especially true for the mining and metals sector."

Maybe we won't be able to cooperate until the anticipated round of court battles is over. I know I'd rather see those resources go into creating a better way to manage mining and still protect the environment. Cutting regulations and subsidizing the industry isn't the way to get where we want and need to be. Don't be surprised to find more to read about that in future postings.

Meanwhile, I hope the Vikings game turns out to be worth watching and that the development of frost bite over the next week or so becomes an indication of the common sense Minnesotans frequently display.

Developers

By Alice Lyons  

Read the Q & A 

Greed got in the way. We built a fake estate.

Levinas said to see ourselves we need each other yet

doorbells, rows of them, glow in the night village

a string of lit invitations no elbow has leaned into

(both arms embracing messages). Unanswered

the doors are rotting from the bottom up.

It’s another perplexing pothole in our road, loves.

Hard core from the quarry might make it level,

hard core and cunning speculation into matters

concerning love and doubt, concerning want and plenty.

O the places where pavement runs out and ragwort

springs up, where Lindenwood ends but doesn’t abut

anywhere neatly, a petered-out plot of Tayto

tumbleweeds, bin bags, rebar, roof slates, offcuts,

guttering, drain grilles, doodads, infill, gravel!

A not-as-yet nice establishment, possessing potential

where we have no authorized voice but are oddly fitted

out for the pain it takes to build bit by bit.

When the last contractions brought us to the brink

of our new predicament, we became developers.

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Recommendations for "Responsible Mining in the Lake Superior Basin"

Less than a decade ago, there was an organization called the Lake Superior Binational Forum (Lake Superior Binational Forum Funding Has Been Eliminated by US EPA). In 2013 it drafted a statement on Responsible Mining in the Lake Superior Basin which contains

... recommendations for future mining operations, briefly summarized as follows:

1. Develop a common set of criteria for use by governments, NGOs and industry to guide the permitting process. Currently public agencies use different criteria in each state.

2. Avoid mining in places with high environmental or social/cultural value.

3. Improve public participation by stakeholders in the environmental assessment process through the collection of adequate baseline data; consideration of potential worst-case scenarios; and independent third-party review processes.

4. Water quality objectives that are consistent with the LAMP should be developed.

5. Overburden and tailings should be discharged into water bodies or wetlands; acid-generating materials should be segregated; and hazardous materials plans should be made public.

6. Companies should make atmospheric emission reports. Environmental assessments should consider greenhouse gas emissions from mining operations.

7. Companies should set aside financial resources for the exploration phase to cover clean-ups, reclamation and long-term monitoring. The public should have the right to comment on the adequacy of these resources and reclamation activities.

8. The public should have the right to access monitoring and periodic technical reports during the life of the mining operation; and to do independent third-party review of the process.

9. Companies should have a reclamation plan with resources set aside for each operation. Mined areas should be re-contoured and stabilized.

10. Citizen participation and oversight are important elements listed under “social impacts and decision making,” including the engagement of Tribal Nations, First Nations and Metis.

11. Research is needed on the cumulative and indirect effects of mining; climate change and mining impacts; and human health research, including impacts on people, fish and wild rice.

overlooking the St. Louis River entering Duluth Harbor and Lake Superior

Photo by J. Harrington

The Lake Superior LAMP 2015-2019 notes this about mining's impacts [p. 48 & 49]:

The Lake Superior basin has a long history of mining operations and related impacts. While mining operations can offer economic benefits, they also present threats to the environment. For example, two Great Lakes Areas of Concern, Deer Lake and Torch Lake, were so designated in the Lake Superior basin due to impacts from past mining operations. Fourteen mines currently operate in the Lake Superior basin, with many explorations and expansions underway. Current and/or past mines in the basin have extracted gold, silver, copper, platinum, palladium, nickel, zinc, diamond, lead, iron-ore and taconite, as well as quarried brownstone. Mining impacts cannot be easily reversed –some can cause far reaching and lasting environmental damage. Mining activity has the potential to impairwater quality(e.g., mining is currently the largest source of mercury emissions from within the Lake Superior basin) and degrade habitat (e.g., through increased sediments). Mining sediments in the nearshore, embayments,and river mouths may cover or degrade fish spawning habitats, Wild Rice and other natural resources. After a mine closes, it can remain a source of contamination from chemicals and waste rock piles; tailing ponds must be monitored and maintained for centuries to avoid environmental impacts. 

Recent developments regarding the water discharge permit issued by the Minnesota Pollution Control  Agency make it, at best, questions whether Minnesota is honoring recommendations 3, 8 and 10. The lack of Water Quality Based Effluent Limits in the issued permit would seem to make it impossible to determine consistency with any water quality objective found in or derived from the LAMP.

In order to assess whether mining is responsible and sustainable, both process and substantive criteria should be agreed upon and compliance with those criteria should be regularly assessed in a transparent process. In Minnesota, we don't seem to be there yet.

We're going to share the usual poem we put here one stanza at a time. It's a long poem but, we believe, fits really well with the theme we're developing.

Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings

By Joy Harjo

3. GIVE CONSTRUCTIVE FEEDBACK:

We speak together with this trade language of English. This trade language enables us to speak across many language boundaries. These languages have given us the poets:

Ortiz, Silko, Momaday, Alexie, Diaz, Bird, Woody, Kane, Bitsui, Long Soldier, White, Erdrich, Tapahonso, Howe, Louis, Brings Plenty, okpik, Hill, Wood, Maracle, Cisneros, Trask, Hogan, Dunn, Welch, Gould...

The 1957 Chevy is unbeatable in style. My broken-down one-eyed Ford will have to do. It holds everyone: Grandma and grandpa, aunties and uncles, the children and the babies, and all my boyfriends. That's what she said, anyway, as she drove off for the Forty-Nine with all of us in that shimmying wreck.

This would be no place to be without blues, jazz—Thank you/mvtoto the Africans, the Europeans sitting in, especially Adolphe Sax with his saxophones... Don't forget that at the center is the Mvskoke ceremonial circles. We know how to swing. We keep the heartbeat of the earth in our stomp dance feet.

You might try dancing theory with a bustle, or a jingle dress, or with turtles strapped around your legs. You might try wearing colonization like a heavy gold chain around a pimp's neck.

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Two more ways to protect the BWCA and Lake Superior

Within the past week, this story was in the local news:

Feds reopen forests near Boundary Waters to mining

Thanks more our general level of skepticism about Minnesotans' reliance on our current mine permitting-environmental protection systems, rather than any particular prescience, we posted, during July of this year, the following:

Might International Mining Sustainability Standards help protect our Boundary Waters?

Much of the rest of the world is moving toward sustainable production and procurement of commodity raw materials and products created therefrom. Minnesota had representatives from three of its entities at a recent sustainable procurement conference. Perhaps someone from the economic development and materials production side of the state should also be involved.

We've been tracking the potential for sustainable or responsible mining for several years now, in part because of our prior experience as a member of the board of directors when Minnesota was an independent chapter of the United States Green Building Council [USGBC], an international organization that brought us Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design [LEED] standards.

As a point of reference, below is the wording used in the most of current draft version of LEED v4:
Mined or quarried materials. For raw materials that are mined or quarried using practices covered in the Framework for Responsible Mining or USGBC-approved equivalent, obtain signed letters from the owners of the manufacturing companies and their raw materials suppliers, stating that they have reviewed and understood the Framework for Responsible Mining and publicly declared their commitment to responsible mining. Each raw material supplier must provide an independently audited checklist listing all of the Framework for Responsible Mining’s Leading Edge Issues, and identifying which Leading Edge measures they are currently taking.

As we read it, the Framework for Responsible Mining was/is a predecessor to the standards being developed by the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance [IRMA], about which we've posted here a number of times.

should areas like this be protected from mining?

Photo by J. Harrington

There may be a very good reason, that we can't think of at the moment, that would preclude one or more of Minnesota's mine permitting agencies, that hasn't already issued which permit(s) it's responsible for, from including a requirement that the permit holder obtain and maintain an IRMA certification for the site(s) covered by the permit. This seems particularly relevant to the PolyMet project. If the certification lapsed or was withdrawn, the permit would immediately become invalid and operations would need to cease, and whatever financial assurance funds were available could then begin to be used to minimize problems associated with the cessation.

Minnesota seems to be lagging further and further behind the best practices in world-wide mining development and management. Relying on political solutions or strictly technical or financial options is not likely to provide adequate protection for our resources, including our taxpayers. We need a more holistic effort. Becoming a participant, and then a leader, in helping make mining sustainable, including confirming the extent to which the BWCA and Voyagers National Park could and should qualify as "no-go zones" for mining seems overdue. If participation in the development of IRMA standards is good enough for the United Steel Workers, perhaps such standards might even benefit the  economy of the Iron Range.

Descartes' Loneliness

By Allen Grossman

Toward evening, the natural light becomes

intelligent and answers, without demur:

“Be assured! You are not alone. . . .”

But in fact, toward evening, I am not

convinced there is any other except myself

to whom existence necessarily pertains.

I also interrogate myself to discover

whether I myself possess any power

by which I can bring it about that I

who now am shall exist another moment.

Because I am mostly a thinking thing

and because this precise question can only

be from that thoughtful part of myself,

if such a power did reside within me

I should, I am sure, be conscious of it. . . .

But I am conscious of no such power.

And yet, if I myself cannot be

the cause of that assurance, surely

it is necessary to conclude that

I am not alone in the world. There is

some other who is the cause of that idea.

But if, at last, no such other can be

found toward evening, do I really have

sufficient assurance of the existence

of any other being at all? For,

after a most careful search, I have been

unable to discover the ground of that

conviction—unless it be imagined a lonely

workman on a dizzy scaffold unfolds

a sign at evening and puts his mark to it.

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Sustainability delayed is sustainability denied

This morning we downloaded the Mining Association of Canada's 2017 Towards Sustainable Mining (TSM) Progress Report. As we were browsing the contents, we wondered if Minnesota and Minnesotans might ever benefit from a similar comprehensive overview of mining company activities. Here's a link to Minnesota Department of Natural Resources Division of Lands and Minerals publications page. We couldn't find any performance reports there. The Division also has a 2017-2027 Strategic Plan. We didn't notice any reference to performance measures for mining there either. In fact, none of the links on the Division's home page look promising if one were hoping to learn about the overall impact of mining, both ferrous and non-ferrous on Minnesota. If anyone can point us toward anything like the MAC's report, please do so.

why doesn't Minnesota have one of these reports?

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency's web site also has a page on Mining. Lots of interesting looking links there, but noting we noted that appears to lead to any kind of mining performance report.

Minnesota state government also has a Minerals Coordinating Committee [MCC] web page. The MCC was created "To provide for the diversification of the State's mineral economy through long term support of mineral exploration, development, production, and commercialization".  Their web site has a page to facilitate "Doing Business in Minnesota," but no report we could find on the impacts of mining on the state's resources, environment or people.

There's nothing on the Minnesota Department of Commerce's web site that would lead one to look for the performance of the mining sector in Minnesota. The Minnesota Mining web site makes some general statements about compliance with Minnesota's strict environmental standards, but no report on how any mines have actually met standards and what those standards are. WHY HASN'T MINNESOTA MINING PROPOSED PROCESSES, STANDARDS AND REPORTING COMPARABLE TO CANADA'S TOWARD SUSTAINABLE MINING? Is Minnesota becoming "low-hanging fruit" in the international mining sector, or has it already attained that status?

There are at least two noteworthy aspects of Canada's TSM approach that we admire. First, it involves representatives from a broad spectrum of interests (Community of Interests) in an oversight and confirmation role. Second, they've been at this for a number of years and seem to be demonstrating real world performance improvements. This is not simply a "we're meeting permit requirements" effort. The number of sectors involved should help minimize "greenwashing" opportunities. (For how many years did Minnesota's water quality "sulfate standard" go unenforced? How many Minnesota mines continued to operate for years under expired discharge permits because the mine operator had applied for a renewed or new permit on a timely basis and the Pollution Control Agency had higher, other priorities than processing those permits?)

At Tower Peak

by Gary Snyder

Every tan rolling meadow will turn into housing
Freeways are clogged all day
Academies packed with scholars writing papers
City people lean and dark
This land most real
As its western-tending golden slopes
And bird-entangled central valley swamps
Sea-lion, urchin coasts
Southerly salmon-probes
Into the aromatic almost-Mexican hills
Along a range of granite peaks
The names forgotten,
An eastward running river that ends out in desert
The chipping ground-squirrels in the tumbled blocks
The gloss of glacier ghost on slab
Where we wake refreshed from ten hours sleep
After a long day's walking
Packing burdens to the snow
Wake to the same old world of no names,
No things, new as ever, rock and water,
Cool dawn birdcalls, high jet contrails.
A day or two or million, breathing
A few steps back from what goes down
In the current realm.
A kind of ice age, spreading, filling valleys
Shaving soils, paving fields, you can walk in it
Live in it, drive through it then
It melts away
For whatever sprouts
After the age of
Frozen hearts. Flesh-carved rock
And gusts on the summit,
Smoke from forest fires is white,
The haze above the distant valley like a dusk.
It's just one world, this spine of rock and streams
And snow, and the wash of gravels, silts
Sands, bunchgrasses, saltbrush, bee-fields,
Twenty million human people, downstream, here below.

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Undermining Water Quality #CleanWaterWednesday

I know it's only Monday, but AGATE magazine published yesterday a Stephanie Hemphill story that Minnesota tweaks wild rice rule, a version of which had appeared in MinnPost in late July, and on Saturday, the Minnesota DFL Central Committee deferred action on a resolution opposing sulfide mining. I need to get this off my chest.

Although we're pleased that the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) is working to improve the scientific validity of its sulfate formula to protect wild rice, we are reminded of some concerns expressed in My Minnesota when MPCA proposed a site specific approach to water quality standards. Let's take a moment to elaborate on the situation:

St. Louis River, Jay Cooke State Park

Photo by J. Harrington

• MPCA "has put most of the agency’s mining permitting work 'on pause' to concentrate on the sulfate standard review." [AGATE, 8/7/16] This suggests resource constraints that could well hinder site specific water quality standards setting. Will Minnesota's legislature fund the positions needed if the new and improved sulfate standard is adopted?


• MPCA already has a notable backlog of taconite mining related discharge permits that need to be updated or rewritten. How many more years will go by while standards for each site are set to enable mining permits to be updated?


• The Clean Water Act amendments became law in 1972. MPCA is still working on setting water quality standards with Total Maximum Daily Loads for most of Minnesota's waters.
  PLEASE NOTE: through the rest of this month, you can comment on MPCA's latest update to Minnesota's impaired waters list. Will Minnesota, despite Legacy Act funding be faced with several more generations delay in attaining the 1983 interim water quality goal of "fishable-swimmable" waters?


• The Minnesota Legislature, particularly the Iron Range delegation, is being scrutinized for their participation in MPCA's water pollution control activities. There's reason to question whether this will change if MPCA retains its federally delegated authority to issue discharge permits or set water quality standards.

Minnesota's North Shore of Lake Superior

Photo by J. Harrington

Back in 1980, The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency approved a statewide water quality management plan in accordance with Section 208 of the Clean Water Act amendments. That document noted:

6. Mining: The mining study was very limited in scope. It consisted mainly of a field survey by the MPCA to investigate possible sedimentation from abandoned waste piles. This narrow scope was chosen because other mining non-point source issues--active iron ore and taconite mining, peat mining, and potential cop- per/nickel mining--were already under investigation by other state agencies. The strategy adopted by the MPCA staff was to wait for the results of these other studies and follow up, if necessary, in future 208 planning.

As this is being written, My Minnesota awaits a response from the Legislative Reference Library to learn if they know of any updates to the 1980 plan. It would seem, however, that Minnesota has a long-standing tradition of deferring action on mining-related water pollution issues. How long did it take to resolve the Reserve Mining discharges? In Massachusetts, local environmental organizations had to sue the federal Environmental Protection Agency and the state government to help protect Cape Cod's fresh water supply. Will it come to something like that in Minnesota?

I wish I felt we had made progress. We might if we would stop trying to win a race to the bottom on a global scale. The public sector in Minnesota alone has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to treat polluted water. It faces similar costs in the future. Those investments will be wasted if industry and agriculture continue to evade their responsibilities to protect our water resources. It's time for more leaders like Judge Lord on Reserve and Governor Perpich, who hoped Minnesota would lose a Wisconsin law suit requiring the Twin Cities to clean up its combined sewer overflows. The Twin Cities rose to the challenge. In 1974, Reserve Mining's Chairman answered Judge Lord's request to clean up their discharge "We don't have to, we won't." More than 40 years later, Governor Dayton "said that U.S. Steel had told state regulators they 'wouldn’t accept a 10 mg/l sulfate standard.'” Clearly, the mining industry continues to evade their environmental and social responsibilities, aided and abetted by Minnesota's legislature. I'm not sure that a Minnesota water ethic will do much to change industry's, or the legislature's attitude.That's not fair to those who meet and go beyond in their efforts to make Minnesota a sustainable state with clean water that supports the state's official grain.

The Theft Outright

By Heid E. Erdrich

          after Frost

We were the land's before we were.

Or the land was ours before you were a land.

Or this land was our land, it was not your land.

We were the land before we were people,

loamy roamers rising, so the stories go,

or formed of clay, spit into with breath reeking soul—

What's America, but the legend of Rock 'n' Roll?

Red rocks, blood clots bearing boys, blood sands

swimming being from women's hands, we originate,

originally, spontaneous as hemorrhage.

Un-possessing of what we still are possessed by,

possessed by what we now no more possess.

We were the land before we were people,

dreamy sunbeams where sun don't shine, so the stories go,

or pulled up a hole, clawing past ants and roots—

Dineh in documentaries scoff DNA evidence off.

They landed late, but canyons spoke them home.

Nomadic Turkish horse tribes they don't know.

What's America, but the legend of Stop 'n' Go?

Could be cousins, left on the land bridge,

contrary to popular belief, that was a two-way toll.

In any case we'd claim them, give them some place to stay.

Such as we were we gave most things outright

(the deed of the theft was many deeds and leases and claim stakes

and tenure disputes and moved plat markers stolen still today . . .)

We were the land before we were a people,

earthdivers, her darling mudpuppies, so the stories go,

or emerging, fully forming from flesh of earth—

The land, not the least vaguely, realizing in all four directions,

still storied, art-filled, fully enhanced.

Such as she is, such as she wills us to become.

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Can mining become a good neighbor?

It's not just Minnesota environmentalists who find fault with the way hardrock mining is done. A previously mentioned article by Jane Kloeckner, "written for completion of an LL.M. in Urban Law, environmental emphasis, at the University of Missouri, Kansas City School of Law" cites a 2004 report, "Office of Inspector General, Evaluation Report, Nationwide Identification of Hardrock Mining Sites, Report No. 2004-P-00005, which found:

"...This [hardrock mining] industry successfully resists modern environmental law protections, follows antiquated mine development rules, and uses waste management practices that damage the environment and harm human health. The federal, state, and tribal environmental and natural resource laws and regulations exempt hardrock mining and mineral processing facilities from reasonable pollution control and allow unsustainable nineteenth century mineral activities and industrial behaviors."

northern Minnesota's St. Louis River

Photo by J. Harrington

We are now well into the 21st century. Hardrock mining has quite a bit of catching up to do as Ms. Kloeckner writes: "Developing a sustainable mining and mineral processing industry with appropriate governmental oversight means (1) enacting “necessary legal, fiscal, and environmental policies”15 to support strong mining institutions with accountability and transparency,16 and (2) establishing clear environmental and social policies, as well as compliance standards that achieve rigorous standards of environmental and social conduct, which would include providing support to local and indigenous populations." Such social policies might have preempted a recent refusal of permission to allow a wetland scientists to access study sites PolyMet hopes to obtain from public lands while also claiming "Modern mining is no threat to Minnesota." That inconsistency reads to me like resistance to transparency and accountability as well as a reflection of the mindset that accompanied mine development in the early days of mining, which sometimes preceded statehood's limited regulatory framework. (small numbers are footnotes in the cited paper.)

solar panels in northern Minnesota

Photo by J. Harrington

On the other hand, several recent news articles reflect growing interest in the development and use of renewable energy by some in the mining sector [The importance of solar and wind energy in Mining; and, Sun-Drenched Miners Look to the Skies to Cut Fuel Costs in Half]. The first article linked even notes  that Glencore, a major investor in the proposed PolyMet NorthMet development, "...recently installed a 3MW wind turbine and energy storage facility at its Raglan mine in the Nunavik region of northern Quebec, in Canada..." to save money on diesel. Is a more "progressive" approach to mine development in locations other than Minnesota, due only to cost savings, or are those locations more insistent that mining companies be better citizens and neighbors as a condition of the "social license" to operate? I don't know how you feel about it, but I'd take a bet that learning to install, maintain and repair solar energy in northern Minnesota probably has a longer and brighter future than either iron or hardrock mining. I'd be betting that the sun will outlast ore. Has Minnesota looked at the idea of a community benefits agreement as a condition of any potential future permits to mine? Why not forego trying to win a race to the bottom and try things the Minnesota way. Remember Reserve!

Our Neighbor:

By Ivan Hobson 

Every family that lived in our court

had an American truck

with a union sticker on the back

and as a kid I admired them

the way I thought our soldiers

must have admired Patton

and Sherman tanks.

You once told me

that the Russians couldn’t take us,

not with towns like ours

full of iron, full of workers tempered

by the fires of foundries and mills.

It wasn’t the Russians that came;

it was the contract, the strike,

the rounds of layoffs that blistered

until your number was called.

I still remember you loading up

to leave for the last time,

the union sticker scraped off

with a putty knife,

the end of the white tarp draped

over your truck bed

flapping as you drove away.

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An ounce of prevention for Poly?

Have you noticed that both the stock market and Minnesota's temperatures have been on a roller coaster recently? I can't quite figure out which is the leading and which the trailing indicator. Based on this report in Wilderness News Online, there's no such volatility in the public response (98% concerned  about or opposed to some element(s) of the PolyMet NorthMet mine proposal) to the Supplemental Draft Environmental Statement [SDEIS] on that project. Minnesota DNR hasn't even finished categorizing the 58,000 comments yet.

On the one hand, I'm glad I don't have the job of getting that project permitted. On the other hand (no, I'm not an economist), if I were charged with that responsibility, I'd want to see the project proposer be a lot more forthcoming about how the company is actually going to go above and beyond business as usual, "we will meet or exceed all regulatory requirements," and I'd want to see that happen a lot earlier in the process. At least we haven't reached the status of our neighbor to the east, where, according to the Wisconsin Citizen's Media Cooperative, Mining Industry Targets “Prove It First” Law.

Nevertheless, Minnesota has some notable limitations in its own sulfide mining regulatory framework, as described in the report "Sulfide Mining Regulation in the Great Lakes Region: A Comparative Analysis of Regulation in Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin & Ontario." Here's a link to the Minnesota Summary, which finds, among other shortcomings:

Minnesota’s policy goal does not necessarily require or aim for “functionality” but rather emphasizes doing the best job possible and returning the environment to the best “practicable” state:

...it is the policy of the Department of Natural Resources that mining be conducted in a manner that will reduce impacts to the extent practicable, mitigate unavoidable impacts, and ensure that the mining area is left in a condition that protects natural resources and minimizes to the extent practicable the need for maintenance.

Minn. Rules 6132.0200. The limitation provided by “to the extent practicable” is in keeping with the general policy of Minnesota’s regulation, which attempts to balance environmental protection with the promotion of economic development:

... it is hereby declared to be the policy of this state to provide for the reclamation of certain lands hereafter subjected to the mining of metallic minerals [...]to control possible adverse environmental effects of mining, to preserve the natural resources, and to encourage the planning of future land utilization, while at the same time promoting the orderly development of mining, the encouragement of good mining practices, and the recognition and identification of the beneficial aspects of mining.

Minn. Stat. §93.44.

As I read the analysis of this particular provision, my concerns about the stringency of financial assurance and long-term environmental protection are heightened. If PolyMet and it's major investors were adamant about having a very proactive environmental management system in place and operating, maybe more than 2% of the 58,000 comments might have been positive. There are enough environmental horror stories associated with international mining that its social license may be close to being expired in many places. What's that old saying about an ounce of prevention being worth a pound of cure? Here's a link to advice on sustainability from Global Mining magazine: 6 Sustainable Initiatives You Need to Implement in Your Mining Operations.

I'm just guessing here, but if the initial DEIS had truly been done proactively, could it have saved 2 or 3 years of environmental review prior to even getting to the permitting? See the Initiative about Transparency.

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For Earth Day 2022, let’s mine our own business

Tomorrow is Earth Day. Today, in honor of tomorrow, I urged my Congressman (Republican) and my two US Senators (Democrats), to support reforms to the 1872 Mining law. The kind of reforms I want to see, and that I think we all deserve, include:

• Establish meaningful Tribal consultation and Indigenous resource protections.


• Protecting special places from mining


• Strengthening environmental standards


• Fiscal reforms
• unlike all other extractive industries, hardrock mining pays no royalty for minerals taken from public lands;
• for $5 an acre, mining interests have patented (purchased) an area roughly equivalent in size to the state of Connecticut containing minerals valued at more than $300 billion.

• Enforcement, inspection, and bonding


• Abandoned mine reclamation fund

It’s the only home we’ve got
Image Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring

In Minnesota, proposed hardrock mines threaten water quality in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area. Mining employment has been declining in the iron mining sector and miners have been clamoring for jobs that support their way of life. I don’t know of any employment sector that offers such protections, do you?

One of the organizations to which I’ve long been a member is Trout Unlimited. They’ve been working for several years on behalf of responsible mining.

At the center of Trout Unlimited’s work on responsible hardrock mining is a commitment avoiding the mistakes of the past. To this end, we approach new mines on a case-by-case basis. We work directly with mining companies, as well as state and federal permitting agencies, to apply policy and practices to mitigate the impacts of new mines on coldwater fisheries. In the case of a wrong mine in the wrong place, Trout Unlimited will strongly advocate in opposition. Location is everything and when the threat of groundwater depletion, acid-mine drainage and potential for spills cannot be responsibly mitigated, Trout Unlimited reserves the right to say no.

They also are advocating for A “Good Samaritan” bill in Congress would make it easier for conservationists and partners to tackle abandoned mines polluting Western waters .

Personally, I believe it would be fantastic if mining reform legislation were combined with Right to Repair, enhanced incentives for recycling electronics waste, and requirements that all metals used in products sold in the US be produced in accord with the standards of the Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance and be ISEAL certified.

It’s been more than fifty years since the first Earth Day. We’ve made too little progress protecting our only life support systems. That’s why we’re in the trouble we’re in. We can and must do better. Mining is a global industry that should be required to meet stringent global standards for protecting the environment, affected communities and those who do the actual mining.

An Earth Song 

Langston Hughes - 1901-1967

It's an earth song,—
And I've been waiting long for an earth song. 
It's a spring song,—
And I've been waiting long for a spring song. 
    Strong as the shoots of a new plant 
    Strong as the bursting of new buds
    Strong as the coming of the first child from its mother's womb. 
It's an earth song, 
A body song, 
A spring song, 
I have been waiting long for this spring song. 

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