Minnesota isn't ready for Twin Metals, but it could be!

The folks at Twin Metals Minnesota have submitted a Mine Plan of Operations to the federal government (Bureau of Land Management) and a Scoping Environmental Assessment Worksheet to the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. The newspaper story in the Star Tribune didn't mention red ribbons or bows so maybe the documents aren't intended as a Christmas present.

Twin Metals Ely, MN offices

Photo by J. Harrington

Since it is likely to take years before the issues related to this proposed project will get sorted out, let alone resolved, we think this is a good time to refresh some fundamentals about mining and sustainable development. The best approach we've found thus far is in a framework called The Natural Step, which posits Four System Conditions:

In the sustainable society, nature is not subject to systematically increasing: 

1. concentrations of substances extracted from the Earth's crust, 

2. concentrations of substances produced by society, 

3. degradation by physical means and, in that society... 

4. people are not subject to conditions that systematically undermine their capacity to meet their needs.

No doubt in the days, months, and years ahead, we will be subjected to repeated assertions to the effect that Minnesota and the United States have the most rigorous environmental standards when it comes to mining. And yet, and yet, we have damn few, if any, mines that do not contribute significant amounts of pollution and that don't "degrade by physical means." Trout Unlimited, an organization I've belonged to for years and years, notes, in regard to hard rock mining, that "Approximately 110,000 miles of streams – enough to circle the Earth four times – are listed as impaired for heavy metals or acidity and abandoned mines are a major source of these impairments." We're still waiting to read about examples of mines that have not severely degraded and/or polluted their environment.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology [MIT] has organized a noteworthy amount of information on "Environmentally Sensitive 'Green' Mining." We're very dubious that Minnesota's standards are comparable to the "Environmentally Conscious Mining Standards" MIT lists and describes. Plus, we've seen little, if any, indication that Minnesota's regulatory agencies, or politicians, are the least bit familiar with a book coauthored by a senior lecturer at MIT, Peter Senge. It's titled The Necessary Revolution. One final point, for today, is that we have yet to find any indication that Minnesota is aware of and has considered adopting international mining standards that may meet or exceed current site and federal requirements. The Initiative for Responsible Mining Assurance [IRMA] has developed and published standards. They can be found here.

The Journey

by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice—
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.
But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do—
determined to save
the only life you could save.

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