Background on Sulfide Mining

The Yellow Dog Plains has been explored for minerals since the 1970's by the USGS. In the early 1990's, mineral companies began leasing state owned land and minerals from the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. They developed relationships with the largest land owners in the area and developed a safe platform to begin exploring for minerals. It became clear to the communities of this area in 2002 that interest in this area was very high.

In 2003, the Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve met with Kennecott Minerals to discuss the company's intention. It became known that the interest was due to an ore body that contains high grade nickel and copper deposits, worth approximately $5 to $10 billion. To extract this type of ore, a process commonly known as sulfide mining would need to be used. The ore body lies directly under the Salmon-Trout River in a watershed directly adjacent to the Yellow Dog River and concerns immediately began to arise about the impacts should mining occur. Our organization contacted the National Wildlife Federation and developed a partnership to take a closer look at the safeguards our government had to protect the watershed from sulfide mining.

In 2004, Governor Granholm created a workgroup to talk about possible new legislation that would provide increased protection if mining occurred. The workgroup, comprised of the Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, environmental groups, industry, the Department of Natural Resources, Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, and Kennecott, formulated Part 632. This legislation introduced a new permitting process, safeguards on mining, and outlined recourse for all parties. It was passed in December 2004.

In February 2006, Kennecott Minerals applied for five permits: Air discharge, Groundwater discharge, Mining, Land Use lease, and Exploration lease. The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) deemed it complete after ten days of reviewing 7000 pages. In objection to this obvious skimming over of the application, the National Wildlife Federation took the matters to the court. During the court process, the MDEQ issued a list of 91 technical deficiencies in the application to Kennecott. After two court cases and one appeal, the legal system found that we were not aggreived by the situation, allowing Kennecott to move forward. The company replied to the deficiencies and a public commenting session was held. Over 700 community members spoke in opposition to the mining prospect and the application.

Still, the MDEQ issued a preliminary approval of the permits in January 2007. Shortly after, documents that had been suppressed by the MDEQ were uncovered and brought to light. The suppressed documents were technical reports emphasizing that the company's plan to prevent subsidence (caving in) of the crown pillar as not reflecting best industry standards. The permitting process came to a halt and an internal investigation of the MDEQ took place.

In July 2007, the MDEQ determined that they were not at fault and reissued the preliminary approval. On December 14, 2007, a final approval was given for three permits. In response, Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, National Wildlife Federation, Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, and the Huron Mountain Club filed two contested cases and one lawsuit against the MDEQ. The basis of the injunctions is that MDEQ granted approval to an application that did not meet the criteria of Part 632. The two other permits were needed from the MDNR to have all state permits in hand.

In January 2008, MDNR didnot grant the permits at their monthly meeting but instead asked the company to supply more information. Kennecott responded by elaborating on issues that were of concern to the MDNR and the permits were approved in February 2008. However, the MDNR stipulated that they will not sign the final approval until the company has no impending lawsuits and has acquired a federal permit from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. This permit is called an Underground Injection Control permit and it is needed because of groundwater concerns. The USEPA has not issued the permit and has thus made no indication that it will be in the near future.