Environment Archives - Page 67 of 106

Feds Stand By Current Dam, Salmon Plan For Columbia

The federal government today released its final plan to protect endangered salmon and steelhead in the Columbia River Basin. | credit: Aaron Kunz | rollover image for more

The federal government is standing by its previous plans for managing the Columbia River to prevent the extinction of its salmon and steelhead. That means little would change for dam operations on the West’s biggest river — but only if it wins court approval.

Officials Friday released the finalized plan, known as the biological opinion or BiOp. It guides dam operations to assure they do not lead to the extinction of 13 species of salmon and steelhead that are protected under the Endangered Species Act. The plan has been the subject of more than 20 years of legal conflict between people who want to protect salmon and people who want the dams to produce hydroelectricity and maintain shipping traditions.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is the lead agency in developing the biological opinion. It says the current plan is on track to meet Endangered Species Act goals for the federally protected fish. NOAA officials say the plan may better protect some fish than previously thought.

“The actions outlined in the biological opinion, and the operation of the hydro system, is designed to move us in the direction towards recovery and avoid jeopardy, and this program does that,” said NOAA’s Barry Thom. “It actually does improve the status of the populations over time. But it is not designed to achieve ultimate recovery of the population.”

Officials say the 610-page plan will protect and improve habitat, with specific attention paid to tributaries and estuaries of the Columbia and Snake rivers.

“A major focus of the tributary habitat program is to help us buffer against potential effects of climate change in the system, so that the habitat projects … are designed to maintain and protect the cool water inputs into the system,” Thom said during a conference call with reporters.

NOAA released a draft version of this plan in September.

In 2011, U.S. District Judge James A. Redden rejected the plan and asked the Obama administration to consider more ways to recover the endangered fish.

Redden’s suggestions included spilling more water over the dams to help juvenile salmon safely make it downriver to the ocean, changing reservoirs to help fish passage, and removing the Snake River dams altogether.

The case has been transferred to Judge Michael H. Simon. He has yet to set a court date for the plan’s sponsors and opponents to argue it. He’ll then decide if the plan is adequate to protect Columbia River salmon and steelhead.

Now that the previous version of the plan is partway completed, supporters say a trend toward larger salmon runs shows the plan is working. Terry Flores is with Northwest RiverPartners, which represents commerce and industry groups that defend the presence of hydroelectric dams on the Columbia-Snake system.

“This plan is amazing. It’s the most comprehensive plan we can find anywhere in this country by far,” Flores said.

Environmental groups say they are disappointed with this finalized plan. Gilly Lyons, with advocacy group Save Our Wild Salmon, said the group is frustrated.

“The federal agencies in charge here have re-isuued a slightly tweaked, but largely status quo federal salmon plan that repeats a lot of the same mistakes over the past decade or so that kept them in court and bound them in litigation over these dams and the salmon that they impact,” Lyons said.

Lyons said it is too soon to tell if environmental groups will file another lawsuit.

“With all the stuff that we see in the plan, or that’s not there, as the case may be, it sure looks like the federal government would like to go back to court,” Lyons said.

NOAA officials said there will be a few years before they have to start writing a new 10-year plan beyond 2018.

“One main priority is to carry out this existing biological opinion,” Thom said. “There will be a period of time between [the 2018 discussions] and the next couple of years where I would like to focus our efforts on talking about long-term recovery. … As opposed to focusing either on A) the litigation or B) the details of a new biological opinion beyond 2018.”

Scientists Say Stop Worrying About Fukushima Radioactivity In Fish

Pete Knutson and his son, Dylan, sell their wild-caught salmon at farmer's markets around Seattle. "We had people passing on our fish this year. It was directly because they were worried about Fukushima." | credit: Ashley Ahearn — Pete Knutson and his son, Dylan, sell their wild-caught salmon at farmer’s markets around Seattle. “We had people passing on our fish this year. It was directly because they were worried about Fukushima.” | credit: Ashley Ahearn

Ashley Ahearn, OPB

SEATTLE — Japan’s nuclear disaster released hundreds of millions of gallons of radioactive water in 2011, sparking rampant speculation that a contaminated plume would reach the waters of North America’s West Coast.

Three years later, such speculation is alive and well on the Internet. Consider this video shot at a beach in Northern California and posted last month to YouTube:

“This is one of the problems,” says Kim Martini, a physical oceanographer at the University of Washington who has been following the issue closely. A Geiger counter can tell you if there’s radiation present, she said, “but it can’t differentiate between different kinds of radiation.”

California state officials went back and tested the beach and found the radiation to be naturally occurring in the rock formations there.

Martini and other scientists have received hate mail for trying to dispel some of the online fears about radioactive pollution resulting from the meltdown of Japan’s Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Station. It was triggered by the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami, which struck Japan in March, 2011.

“There’s definitely people that you’re never going to convince… I don’t know what to tell you. The science says it’s OK,” Martini said.

Scientists in California and Oregon have collected samples of tuna, a fish known to migrate back and forth across the Pacific, and analyzed them for radioactive isotopes, Cesium-134 in particular, from Fukushima.

Delvan Neville, a PhD candidate in Radiation Health Physics at Oregon State University, has tested dozens of samples of albacore tuna for radioactivity. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s intervention levels for cesium 134 and cesium 137 is 1200 becquerels per kilogram. The highest levels he’s seen in his albacore, of both cesium 134 and cesium 137 combined, is 1 becquerel per kilogram – a level so low that his device couldn’t pick it up until he concentrated the samples.

“That’s more than 1,000 times lower than the point where the FDA would even think about whether they need to let people eat that food still,” he said.

Neville joked that he was eating the tuna he caught right alongside the samples he collected for science, “which was actually kind of fun because then I was telling people as we were eating at the table what their approximate dose was due to Fukushima from the food they were eating and it’s this ridiculously small number.”

There is radioactive material from Fukushima making its way across the Pacific Ocean and it has already reached the West Coast in small amounts. The largest concentration of radioactive water released during the nuclear meltdown is moving in a plume across the middle of the Pacific, but models project that the majority of the radioactive water will sink or be pushed west again before it hits the U.S. Scientists are still debating how high those radioactivity levels could be. Here’s an interesting video on ocean currents and Fukushima radioactivity:

Kim Martini says here on the West Coast, scientists have found very low levels of cesium from Fukushima:

“It’s about 20,000 times less than drinking water standards. And so what we like to say is it’s detectable but harmless.”

But despite all the evidence, some fish consumers on the West Coast have been wary.

Pete Knutson has been fishing for salmon in Alaska for more than 40 years. He owns and operates Loki Fish Company with his two sons. On the weekends you’ll find him selling his fish at farmer’s markets around Seattle, with white hair flowing out from under a knit cap and an easy laugh that draws passersby up to his stall.

“We have all different kinds of salmon products, pickled salmon, ikura, smoked salmon, canned salmon, whole pink salmon over there,” he gestures to rows of neatly packaged pink salmon meat.

Knutson’s in the business of catching fish, not testing them. But after the Fukushima meltdown his customers wanted answers about the safety of his product.

So he sent seven salmon samples off to an internationally certified lab to test for radioactive isotopes. Five of the seven samples came back without any detectable levels of radioactive isotopes from Fukushima, Knutson said, and two showed levels several hundred times below approved levels.

“We feel very good about the results,” he said.

The tests cost Knutson $1,200 but he says it was a necessary investment.

“People do not trust governmental authorities. They don’t trust corporations. They don’t trust explanations and they don’t have a good science background,” Knutson said. “So it makes for a good combination where rumors can start spreading like wildfire, rumors like the whole pacific is poisoned, rumors like starfish, salmon seals, they’re all poisoned from the radiation and it’s not true. This is not definitive proof that there’s not a problem but it’s an indicator.”

Fisheries in Japan remain closed because of high levels of radioactivity and the ongoing release of contaminated groundwater from the nuclear site, but the FDA, Washington Department of Health, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute and others have stressed that levels of radioactivity in fish that have made their way across the Pacific are not at levels of concern.

Group Calls For Expanding Killer Whale Habitat Protection

Cassandra Profita, OPB

An environmental group is calling for a major expansion in habitat protection for Puget Sound’s killer whales.

Research shows the endangered orcas that live in Puget Sound in the summer are venturing up and down the West Coast in the winter to forage for food. Scientists tracking these southern resident orcas have followed the whales as far north as Alaska and as far south as Monterey, Calif.

Given these findings, the Center for Biological Diversity says the whales need a lot more habitat protection than they have now. The group filed a petition Thursday with the National Marine Fisheries Service to expand protected habitat for the whales from Puget Sound to a large swath of ocean area off the coasts of Washington, Oregon and Northern California.

“They need to protect all of their habitat — not just where the whales hang out in the summer,” says Sarah Uhlemann of the Center for Biological Diversity.

Existing vs. proposed critical habitat.

Protected habitat for species listed under the Endangered Species Act, known as “critical habitat,” comes with restrictions on actions taken by the federal government that might threaten the species’ survival.

Uhlemann says those restrictions would apply to federal decisions on salmon fishing, port expansions and other coastal developments. That would mean any time the federal government decides to do anything -– say the Navy decides to practice some sonar or an agency is deciding whether to permit a port expansion — the government would have to fully consider environmental impacts.

“Not only on the whale but also on its habitat –- and if the impacts are too large they have to stop and mitigate, or lessen what those impacts are,” Uhlemann said.

Lynne Barre is a marine biologist and manager in Seattle with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. She said the federal government was already considering an expansion in habitat protections for southern resident orcas as its tagging research program has revealed more about where the whales are feeding.

“Our knowledge of their habitat in the ocean is increasing,” Barre said. “Gathering additional information about their coastal habitat was one of the priorities we identified when we listed the orcas for protection under the Endangered Species Act in 2005.”

The orcas face threats from a lack of available food because they primarily survive on salmon, Barre said. They also accumulate high levels of contaminants such as flame retardants, legacy pesticides and industrial pollutants that can impact their immune systems. Orcas are acoustic animals that use sound to communicate with each other and find prey, she said, so underwater noises from vessels and other activities pose another threat to the whales.

The existing critical habitat protections in Puget Sound require evaluations of the impacts to whales from pollution discharges, ship passage and construction activities such as pile-driving, Barre said. Federal regulators will have 90 days to decide whether to review the Center for Biological Diversity’s petition to expand the area where those kinds of protections apply.

High Levels of Molecular Chlorine Found in Arctic Atmosphere

By Brett Israel | Georgia Tech

January 13, 2014 Alaska Native News

Scientists studying the atmosphere above Barrow, Alaska, have discovered unprecedented levels of molecular chlorine in the air, a new study reports.

Molecular chlorine, from sea salt released by melting sea ice, reacts with sunlight to produce chlorine atoms. These chlorine atoms are highly reactive and can oxidize many constituents of the atmosphere including methane and elemental mercury, as well activate bromine chemistry, which is an even stronger oxidant of elemental mercury. Oxidized mercury is more reactive and can be deposited to the Arctic ecosystem.

Jin Liao checks the instrumentation in Barrow, Alaska, during a research trip to measure molecular chlorine in the atmosphere. Image-Georgia Tech

The study is the first time that molecular chlorine has been measured in the Arctic, and the first time that scientists have documented such high levels of molecular chlorine in the atmosphere.

“No one expected there to be this level of chlorine in Barrow or in polar regions,” said Greg Huey, a professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta.

The study was published January 12 in the journal Nature Geoscience and was supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF), part of the international multidisciplinary OASIS program.

The researchers directly measured molecular chlorine levels in the Arctic in the spring of 2009 over a six-week period using chemical ionization mass spectrometry. At first the scientists were skeptical of their data, so they spent several years running other experiments to ensure their findings were accurate.

The level of molecular chlorine above Barrow was measured as high as 400 parts per trillion, which is a high concentration considering that chlorine atoms are short –lived in the atmosphere because they are strong oxidants and are highly reactive with other atmospheric chemicals.
Molecular chlorine concentrations peaked in the early morning and late afternoon, and fell to near-zero levels at night. Average daytime molecular chlorine levels were correlated with ozone concentrations, suggesting that sunlight and ozone may be required for molecular chlorine formation.

Previous Arctic studies have documented high levels of oxidized mercury in Barrow and other polar regions. The major source of elemental mercury in the Arctic regions is coal-burning plants around the world. In the spring in Barrow, ozone and elemental mercury are often depleted from the atmosphere when halogens — chlorine and bromine — are released into the air from melting sea ice.

“Molecular chlorine is so reactive that it’s going to have a very strong influence on atmospheric chemistry,” Huey said.

Chlorine atoms are the dominant oxidant in Barrow, the study found. The area is part of a region with otherwise low levels of oxidants in the atmosphere, due to the lack of water vapor and ozone, which are the major precursors to making oxidants in many urban areas.

In Barrow, snow-covered ice pack extends in every direction except inland. The ultimate source of the molecular chlorine is the sodium chloride in sea salt, Huey said, most likely from the snow-covered ice pack. How the sea salt is transformed into molecular chlorine is unknown.

“We don’t really know the mechanism. It’s a mystery to us right now,” Huey said. “But the sea ice is changing dramatically, so we’re in a time where we have absolutely no predictive power over what’s going to happen to this chemistry. We’re really in the dark about the chlorine.”

Scientists do know that sea ice is rapidly changing, Huey said. The sea ice that lasts from one winter to the next winter is decreasing. This has created a larger area of melted ice, and more ice that comes and goes with the seasons. This seasonal variation in ice could release more molecular chlorine into the atmosphere.

“There is definite climate change happening in the Arctic,” Huey said. “That’s changing the nature of the ice, changing the volume of the ice, changing the surface area and changing the chemistry of the ice.”

This research is supported by the National Science Foundation under award number ATM-0807702, ARC-0806437 and ARC-0732556. Any conclusions or opinions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the NSF.

Senate Panel Questions Ecology On Review Of Coal Terminal

Ashley Ahearn, OPB

Washington’s top environmental regulator found herself in the hot seat Thursday during a state Senate hearing called by Republican lawmakers who disapprove her agency’s scrutiny of a coal export terminal proposed for the northern shore of Puget Sound.

At issue: greenhouse gas emissions.

The Department of Ecology caused a stir last year when it announced that it would consider the greenhouse gas emissions produced when 48 million tons of exported coal is burned in Asia – that’s how much coal would move through the Gateway Pacific Terminal every year.

Sen. Doug Ericksen, R-Ferndale, convened a work session to question Ecology officials, including director Maia Bellon, about its move.

Ericksen emphasized fears among business and trade leaders that Ecology’s move sets a precedent.

Some worry that in the future the state could consider the greenhouse gas emissions of say, exporting Boeing airplanes or apples, and that could prevent projects from going forward.

Here’s an exchange between Bellon and Ericksen:

Maia Bellon

Bellon: Because there is no question about the end use of the commodity for the coal transportation projects, it makes that different in terms of the pollution that’s created.

Ericksen: I know we’re over time but I essentially heard you say that the Department of Ecology can pick and choose and no business can have a guarantee of what will be studied and what will not be studied.

Bellon said that greenhouse gases are a pollutant and therefore should be considered in the environmental review of projects.

But she stressed that her agency considers projects on a case-by-case basis and the environmental review is meant to present information. It’s not a final decision on whether a project is built or not.

The committee did not take any action during Thursday’s hearing.

Snohomish County utility awaits approval for tidal turbine

In this June 13, 2011 file photo, the Energy Tide 2, the largest tidal energy turbine ever deployed in the U.S., appears on a barge in Portland, Maine. Scientists at the University of Washington have determined that Admiralty Inlet, in Puget Sound, is an excellent place to test tidal turbines. (AP Photo/File)

BY Tim Haeck on January 15, 2014 MyNorthwest.com

A public electric utility in Everett could be among the first in the nation to generate power from the tides.

Scientists at the University of Washington have determined that Admiralty Inlet, in Puget Sound, is an excellent place to test tidal turbines.

“Admiralty Inlet stacks up pretty well, worldwide, in terms of its actual tidal energy resource,” said Craig Collar, assistant general manager at Snohomish County Public Utility District No. 1. Currents have been clocked at 6-7 knots, he said.

The PUD is pledged to maintain carbon-free power sources. It has wind power and is exploring geo-thermal energy, as well.

“We’re highly dependent on the Bonneville Power Administration,” said Collar. “That’s a lot of eggs in one basket and it only makes sense to diversify.”

The advantage of tidal power: tides are reliable and predictable.

The disadvantage is you have to pick the right spot.

The utility wants to place two turbines, each about 20-feet in diameter, on the bottom of Admiralty Inlet, 200 feet below the surface. The more than $20 million pilot project, funded in half by the U.S. Energy Department, is at least six years in development. It’s been delayed, in part, by a challenge from a California company that owns two trans-ocean fiber optic telecommunications cables.

“The turbines, as currently proposed, are dangerously close to our cable,” said Kurt Johnson, chief financial officer of Pacific Crossing. He’s worried that turbine deployment and maintenance could damage the cables.

“Pacific Crossing is not against tidal energy, or even this specific project. All we’re really asking is that the PUD locate the turbines a safe distance from our cable.”

“In fact, we have done that,” said Collar. “This project is now several hundred feet away from their cable, so the crux of the matter is our project simply doesn’t represent any risk whatsoever to their cable.”

Collar said an environmental review by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), draws the same conclusion.

“The facts are they’ve got a six-inch wide lease, we’re several hundred feet away, we have a deployment accuracy of less than ten feet, we won’t use any anchors at all in the deployment operation or maintenance of these devices,” said Collar.

Tribal and environmental groups have also challenged the project out of concern for fish and orcas.

“But the truth is these turbines rotate quite slowly, more the speed that we’d visualize for a turnstile, taking several seconds just to make a single revolution,” Collar explained.

The utility is awaiting approval of a license from FERC and some state and local permits. The soonest the turbines could be deployed would be 2015.

It’s not known if tidal power will prove effective around here.

The Snohomish County PUD No.1 will hook up the turbines to the power grid but Collar said this pilot project is more about collecting data than generating electricity. If approved, the turbines will operate for three-to-five years and be removed.

Salmon Conservation Efforts Honored

Jan 16, 2014

US Dept of Interior and US Geological Survey

SEATTLE — Today the U.S. Department of Interior recognized the Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership (PNAMP) for its conservation achievements focused on federally listed salmon species. The partnership was selected for a “Partnership in Conservation” award because it improves the scientific foundation for natural and cultural resource management and advances government-to-government relationships with Indian nations.

“The Department of the Interior is proud to recognize the accomplishments of those who are innovating and collaborating in ways that address today’s complex conservation and stewardship challenges,” Secretary Jewell said at an awards ceremony at the Interior headquarters in Washington today. “These partnerships represent the gold standard for how Interior is doing business across the nation to power our future, strengthen tribal nations, conserve and enhance America’s great outdoors and engage the next generation.”

For the past eight years, the Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership has promoted the recovery of Endangered Species Act listed salmon populations that represent a significant cultural resource for four Treaty Indian tribes and numerous non-Treaty tribes, as well as state commercial and sport fisheries. The partnership helps ensure program accountability and avoid duplication of efforts, which can pose problems for resource management. The partnership also plays an important role in increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of water and biological monitoring and in management and exchange of data.

The “Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership demonstrates that the whole truly can be more than the sum of its parts,” said Max Ethridge, U.S. Geological Survey’s Regional Director for the Northwest, “with partners working together in a time of scarce resources, the winner is conservation.”

The Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership is a voluntary partnership of state, tribal and federal entities, supported by a small team of four USGS employees. Working to coordinate efforts of partners and other entities, the Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership strives to improve efficiency and effectiveness of aquatic monitoring programs in the Pacific Northwest. Ultimately, these efforts contribute to the restoration of salmon populations and protection of aquatic habitats throughout the region.

“Salmon recovery is a shared goal,” said Jennifer Bayer, USGS Biologist who oversees the Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership’s staff, “by focusing on common needs and sustaining collaboration among many entities, the Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership enhances partners’ contributions to salmon conservation, ultimately working towards more effective monitoring and data collection efforts.”

The Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership has created free, web accessible tools that help users discover and share data, document methods, and design and manage monitoring programs. The team also organizes workshops, standing workgroups and technical forums to share best practices for documentation, data sharing and data management related to salmon conservation.

The Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership has a unique geographic, technical and policy scope. The Pacific Northwest Aquatic Monitoring Partnership supports partners across Washington, Oregon, Idaho and northern California; engages technical experts in water quality, water supply, energy resources, endangered species recovery, invasive species, ecological modeling and data management; and reports annually to federal, state and tribal executive leadership.

The Partners in Conservation Awards recognize outstanding examples of conservation legacies achieved when the Department of the Interior engages groups and individuals representing a wide range of backgrounds, ages and interests to work collaboratively to renew lands and resources. At the annual awards ceremony, the Department of the Interior celebrated conservation achievements that highlight cooperation among diverse federal, state, local and tribal governments; public and private entities; non-profit organizations; and individuals.

Group: Protect Orcas In West Coast Waters

Credit AP Photo/NOAA Fisheries Service, Candice EmmonsFILE - In this file photo provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and shot Oct. 29, 2013, orca whales from the J and K pods swim past a small research boat on Puget Sound in view of downtown Seattle. — Credit AP Photo/NOAA Fisheries Service, Candice Emmons
FILE – In this file photo provided by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and shot Oct. 29, 2013, orca whales from the J and K pods swim past a small research boat on Puget Sound in view of downtown Seattle.

Jan 16 2014

By The Associated Press

A conservation group is asking federal officials to protect endangered killer whales in the marine waters off the West Coast.

The Center for Biological Diversity on Thursday petitioned the National Marine Fisheries Service to designate critical habitat for orcas along the coast of Washington, Oregon and California.

The southern resident killer whales are frequently seen in Puget Sound during the summer, but little was known about their winter movements until recently.

Federal biologists have tracked the orcas as they traveled extensively along the coast, from Cape Flattery, Wash. to Point Reyes, Calif.

The group says those offshore areas should now be added as critical habitat. Such a designation would require federal officials to limit activities that harm the whales.

A message left with the federal agency was not immediately returned.

EPA: Mining poses risks to Bristol Bay salmon

FILE- In this July 13, 2007 file photo, a worker with the Pebble Mine project test drills in the Bristol Bay region of Alaska near the village of Iliamma, Alaska. An EPA report indicates a large-scale copper and gold mine in Alaska's Bristol Bay region could have devastating effects on the world's largest sockeye salmon fishery and adversely affect Alaska Natives, whose culture is built around salmon. Photo: AL Grillo, AP — FILE- In this July 13, 2007 file photo, a worker with the Pebble Mine project test drills in the Bristol Bay region of Alaska near the village of Iliamma, Alaska. An EPA report indicates a large-scale copper and gold mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay region could have devastating effects on the world’s largest sockeye salmon fishery and adversely affect Alaska Natives, whose culture is built around salmon. Photo: AL Grillo, AP

By BECKY BOHRER, Associated Press

anuary 15, 2014

JUNEAU, Alaska (AP) — A government report indicates a large-scale copper and gold mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay region could have devastating effects on the world’s largest sockeye salmon fishery and adversely affect Alaska Natives, whose culture is built around salmon.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday released its final assessment of the impact of mining in the Bristol Bay region. Its findings are similar to those of an earlier draft report, concluding that, depending on the size of the mine, up to 94 miles of streams would be destroyed in the mere build-out of the project, including losses of between 5 and 22 miles of streams known to provide salmon spawning and rearing habitat. Up to 5,350 acres of wetlands, ponds and lakes also would be lost due to the mine footprint.

The report concludes that “large-scale mining in the Bristol Bay watershed poses significant near- and long-term risk to salmon, wildlife and Native Alaska cultures,” EPA regional administrator Dennis McLerran said in a conference call with reporters.

The battle over the proposed Pebble Mine has been waged for years and extended beyond Alaska’s borders, with environmental activists like actor Robert Redford opposing development. Multinational jewelers have said they won’t use minerals mined from the Alaska prospect, and pension fund managers from California and New York City last year asked London-based Rio Tinto, a shareholder of mine owner Northern Dynasty Minerals Ltd., to divest, a request Rio Tinto said it planned to consider.

EPA has said its goal was to get the science right. McLerran said the report doesn’t recommend any policy or regulatory decisions and will serve as the scientific foundation for the agency’s response to the tribes and others who petitioned EPA in 2010 to use its authority under the Clean Water Act to protect Bristol Bay. He said no timeline for a response had been set.

The report also found that polluted water from the mine site could get into streams through runoff or uncollected leachate, even with the use of modern mining practices. It noted culvert blockages or other failures could impede fish passage and failure of a tailings dam, where mining waste is stored, could be catastrophic though the probability of such a failure was considered quite low.

Supporters of the EPA process hoped it would lead the agency to block or limit the project, action they urged again Wednesday; opponents saw it as an example of government overreach and feared it would lead to a pre-emptive veto.

Jason Metrokin, president and CEO of Bristol Bay Native Corp., said the corporation supports “responsible development where it can be done without causing unacceptable risks to the people, cultures and fishing economy of our region. The proposed Pebble mine is not such a project.”

John Shively, the chief executive of the Pebble Limited Partnership, which was created to design, permit and run the mine, called the report rushed and flawed, saying EPA did not take the time or commit the financial resources to fully assess such a large area. In a statement, he said the report is “a poorly conceived and poorly executed study, and it cannot serve as the scientific basis for any decisions concerning Pebble.”

Some see the mine as a way to provide jobs, but others fear it will disrupt or devastate a way of life. A citizens’ initiative scheduled to appear on the August primary ballot would require legislative approval for any large-scale mine in the region.

The Bristol Bay watershed produces about 46 percent of the world’s wild sockeye salmon, and salmon are key to the way of life for two groups of Alaska Natives in the region, Yup’ik Eskimos and the Dena’ina. The report said the response of Native cultures to any mining impacts was unclear, though it could involve more than the need to compensate for lost food and include some degree of cultural disruption.

Jeff Frithsen, a senior scientist and special projects coordinator with EPA, said the Pebble deposit is a low-grade ore deposit, and over 99 percent of the ore taken from the ground will end up as waste. He said the deposit’s location is at the headwaters of two of the watersheds that make up half the Bristol Bay watershed and produce half its sockeye salmon.

He said the existence of a large-scale mining operation there would affect fish habitat and any accidents would add to that. He said any loss of habitat can affect the overall diversity of the fishery habitat in the watershed.

“Changes in the portfolio of streams within the Bristol Bay watershed can reduce the overall reliability and increase the variability of the fishery over time,” he said.

Asked whether EPA believed a mine could co-exist with fish, McLerran said the assessment spoke for itself.

While EPA initiated the review process in response to concerns about the impact of the proposed Pebble Mine on fisheries, the report wasn’t meant to be about a single project.

EPA said the report looks at possible impacts of reasonably foreseeable mining activities in the region. The agency said it drew on a preliminary plan published by Northern Dynasty and consulted with mining experts on reasonable scenarios.

Alaska Gov. Sean Parnell said in a statement the report was little more than a pretext for an EPA veto of the state’s permitting process. “As my record demonstrates, I will not trade one resource for another, and every permitting application — when filed — deserves scientific and public scrutiny based on facts, not hypotheticals.”

The Pebble Partnership has called the mine deposit one of the largest of its kind in the world, with the potential of producing 80.6 billion pounds of copper, 107.4 million ounces of gold and 5.6 billion pounds of molybdenum over decades.

While EPA focused on the effects of one mine, the report said several mines could be developed in the watersheds studied, each of which would pose risks similar to those highlighted.

___

Online:

To read the assessment: http://www2.epa.gov/bristolbay

Crow & Lummi, Dirty Coal & Clean Fishing

Courtesy National Oceanic and Atmospheric AdministrationKnown as “home to the Ancient Ones,” Cherry Point in Washington state is home to a stable fishing ecosystem that supports the Lummi Nation, and has become a recent point of interest for a Coal export for the Crow — Courtesy National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Known as “home to the Ancient Ones,” Cherry Point in Washington state is home to a stable fishing ecosystem that supports the Lummi Nation, and has become a recent point of interest for a Coal export for the Crow

Winona LaDuke, ICTMN, 1/15/14

“The tide is out and the table is set…” Justin Finklebonner gestures to the straits on the edge of the Lummi reservation. This is the place where the Lummi people have gathered their food for a millennium. It is a fragile and bountiful ecosystem, part of the Salish Sea, newly corrected in it’s naming by cartographers. When the tide goes out, the Lummi fishing people go to their boats—one of the largest fishing fleets in any Indigenous community. They feed their families, and they fish for their economy.

This is also the place where corporations fill their tankers and ships to travel into the Pacific and beyond. It is one of only a few deep water ports in the region, and there are plans to build a coal terminal here. That plan is being pushed by a few big corporations, and one Indian nation—the Crow Nation, which needs someplace to sell the coal it would like to mine, in a new deal with Cloud Peak Energy. The deal is a big one: 1.4 billion tons of coal to be sold overseas. There have been no new coal plants in the United States for 30 years, so Cloud Peak and the Crow hope to find their fortunes in China. The mine is called Big Metal, named after a Crow legendary hero.

The place they want to put a port for huge oil tankers and coal barges is called Cherry Point, or XweChiexen. It is sacred to the Lummi. There is a 3,500-year-old village site here. The Hereditary Chief of the Lummi Nation, tsilixw (Bill James), describes it as the “home of the Ancient Ones.” It was the first site in Washington State to be listed on the Washington Heritage Register.

Coal interests hope to construct North America’s largest coal export terminal on this “home of the Ancient Ones.” Once there, coal would be loaded onto some of the largest bulk carriers in the world to China. The Lummi nation is saying Kwel hoy’: We draw the line. The sacred must be protected.

So it is that the Crow Nation needs a friend among the Lummi and is having a hard time finding one. In the meantime, a 40-year old coal mining strategy is being challenged by Crow people, because culture is tied to land, and all of that may change if they starting mining for coal. And, the Crow tribal government is asked by some tribal members why renewable energy is not an option.

The stakes are high, and the choices made by sovereign Native nations will impact the future of not only two First Nations, but all of us.

How it Happens

It was a long time ago that the Crow People came from Spirit Lake. They emerged to the surface of this earth from deep in the waters. They emerged, known as the Hidatsa people, and lived for a millennia or more on the banks of the Missouri River. The most complex agriculture and trade system in the northern hemisphere, came from their creativity and their diligence. Hundreds of varieties of corn, pumpkins, squash, tobacco, berries—all gifts to a people. And then the buffalo—50 million or so—graced the region. The land was good, as was the life. Ecosystems, species and cultures collide and change. The horse transformed people and culture. And so it did for the Hidatsa and Crow people, the horse changed how the people were able to hunt—from buffalo jumps, from which carefully crafted hunt could provide food for months, to the quick and agile movement of a horse culture, the Crow transformed. They left their life on the Missouri, moving west to the Big Horn Mountains. They escaped some of what was to come to the Hidatsas, the plagues of smallpox and later the plagues of agricultural dams which flooded a people and a history- the Garrison project, but the Crow, if any, are adept at adaptation. The Absaalooka are the People of the big beaked black bird —that is how they got their name, the Crow. The River Crow and the Mountain Crow, all of them came to live in the Big Horns, made by the land, made by the horse, and made by the Creator.

A Good Country

“The Crow country is a good country. The Great Spirit has put it exactly in the right place; while you are in it you fare well; whenever you go out of it, whichever way you travel, you will fare worse… The Crow country is exactly in the right place.”

–Arapooish Crow leader, to Robert Campbell, Rocky Mountain Fur Company, c.1830

The Absaalooka were not born coal miners. That’s what happens when things are stolen from you—your land, reserved under treaty, more than 30 million acres of the best land in the northern plains, the heart of their territory. This is what happens with historic trauma, and your people and ancestors disappear – “1740 was the first contact with the Crow,” Sharon Peregoy, a Crow Senator in the Montana State legislature, explains. “It was estimated… to be 40,000 Crows, with a 100 million acres to defend. Then we had three bouts of smallpox, and by l900, we were greatly reduced to about l,750 Crows.”

“The 1825 Treaty allowed the settlers to pass through the territory.” The Crow were pragmatic. “We became an ally with the U.S. government. We did it as a political move, that’s for sure.” That didn’t work out. The 1851 Fort Laramie Treaty identified 38 million acres as reserved, while the 1868 Fort Laramie Treaty greatly reduced the reservation to 8 million acres. A series of unilateral congressional acts further cut down the Crow land base, until only 2.3 million acres remained.

“The l920 Crow Act’s intent was to preserve Crow land to ensure Crow tribal allottees who were ranchers and farmers have the opportunity to utilize their land,” Peregoy explains.

Into the heart of this came the Yellowtail Dam. That project split the Crow people and remains, like other dams flooding Indigenous territories, a source of grief, for not only is the center of their ecosystem, but it benefits largely non-Native landowners and agricultural interests, many of whom farm Crow territory. And, the dam provides little financial returns for the tribe. The dam was a source of division, says Peregoy.“We were solid until the vote on the Yellowtail Dam in l959.”

In economic terms, essentially, the Crow are watching as their assets are taken to benefit others, and their ecology and economy decline. “Even the city of Billings was built on the grass of the Crows,“ Peregoy says.

Everything Broken Down

“Our people had an economy and we were prosperous in what we did. Then with the reservation, everything we had was broken down and we were forced into a welfare state.”

–Lane Simpson, Professor, Little Big Horn College

One could say the Crow know how to make lemonade out of lemons. They are renowned horse people and ranchers, and the individual landowners, whose land now makes up the vast majority of the reservation, have tried hard to continue that lifestyle. Because of history of land-loss, the Crow tribe owns some l0 percent of the reservation.

The Crow have a short history of coal strip mining—maybe 50 years. Not so long in Crow history, but a long time in an inefficient fossil fuel economy. Westmoreland Resource’s Absaloka mine opened in 1974. It produces about 6 million tons of coal a year and employs about 80 people. That deal is for around 17 cents a ton.

Westmoreland has been the Crow Nation’s most significant private partner for over 39 years, and the tribe has received almost 50 percent of its general operating income from this mine. Tribal members receive a per-capita payment from the royalties, which, in the hardship of a cash economy, pays many bills.

Then there is Colstrip, the power plant complex on the border of Crow—that produces around 2,800 mw of power for largely west coast utilities and also employs some Crows. Some 50 percent of the adult population is still listed as unemployed, and the Crow need an economy that will support their people and the generations ahead. It is possible that the Crow may have become cornered into an economic future which, it turns out, will affect far more than just them.

Big Metal Mine, named after a legendary Crow (Courtesy Big Metal Coal)

Enter Cloud Peak

In 2013, the Crow Nation signed an agreement with Cloud Peak to develop 1.4 billion tons in the Big Metal Mine, named after a legendary Crow. The company says it could take five years to develop a mine that would produce up to 10 million tons of coal annually, and other mines are possible in the leased areas. Cloud Peak has paid the tribe $3.75 million so far.

The Crow nation may earn copy0 million over those first five years. The Big Metal Mine, however may not be a big money-maker. Coal is not as lucrative as it once was, largely because it is a dirty fuel. According to the Energy Information Administration, l75 coal plants will be shut down in the next few years in the U.S.

So the target is China. Cloud Peak has pending agreements to ship more than 20 million tons of coal annually through two proposed ports on the West Coast.

Back to the Lummi

The Gateway Pacific Coal terminal would be the largest such terminal on Turtle Island’s west coast. This is what large means: an l,l00 acre terminal, moving up to 54 million metric tons of coal per year, using cargo ships up to l,000 feet long. Those ships would weigh maybe 250,000 tons and carry up to 500,000 gallons of oil. Each tanker would take up to six miles to stop.

All of that would cross Lummi shellfish areas, the most productive shellfish territory in the region. “It would significantly degrade an already fragile and vulnerable crab, herring and salmon fishery, dealing a devastating blow to the economy of the fisher community,” the tribe said in a statement.

The Lummi community has been outspoken in its opposition, and taken their concerns back to the Powder River basin, although not yet to the Crow Tribe. Jewell Praying Wolf James is a tribal leader and master carver of the Lummi Nation. “There’s gonna be a lot of mercury and arsenic blowing off those coal trains,” James says. “That is going to go into a lot of communities and all the rivers between here and the Powder River Basin.”

Is there a Way Out?

Is tribal sovereignty a carte blanche to do whatever you want? The Crow Tribe’s coal reserves are estimated at around 9 billion tons of coal. If all the Crow coal came onto the market and was sold and burned, according to a paper by Avery Old Coyote, it could produce an equivalent of 44.9 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide.

That’s a lot of carbon during a time of climate challenge.

Then there are the coal-fired power plants. They employ another 380 people, some of them Crow, and generating some 2,094 mw of electricity. The plants are the second largest coal generating facilities west of the Mississippi. PSE’s coal plant is the dirtiest coal-burning power plant in the Western states, and the eighth dirtiest nationwide. The amount of carbon pollution that spews from Colstrip’s smokestacks is almost equal to two eruptions at Mt. St. Helen’s every year.

Coal is dirty. That’s just the way it is. Coal plant operators are planning to retire 175 coal-fired generators, or 8.5 percent of the total coal-fired capacity in the U.S., according to the Energy Information Administration. A record number of generators were shut down in 2012. Massive energy development in PRB contributes more than 14 percent of the total U.S. carbon pollution, and the Powder River Basin is some of the largest reserves in the world. According to the United States Energy Information Administration, the world emits 32.5 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide each year. The Crow Tribe will effectively contribute more than a year and a half of the entire world’s production of carbon dioxide.

There, is, unfortunately, no bubble over China, so all that carbon will end up in the atmosphere.

The Crow Nation chairman, Darrin Old Coyote, says coal was a gift to his community that goes back to the tribe’s creation story. “Coal is life,” he says. “It feeds families and pays the bills…. [We] will continue to work with everyone and respect tribal treaty rights, sacred sights, and local concerns. However, I strongly feel that non-governmental organizations cannot and should not tell me to keep Crow coal in the ground. I was elected to provide basic services and jobs to my citizens and I will steadfastly and responsibly pursue Crow coal development to achieve my vision for the Crow people.”

In 2009, 1,133 people were employed by the coal industry in Montana. U.S. coal sales have been on the decline in recent years, and plans to export coal to Asia will prop up this industry a while longer. By contrast, Montana had 2,155 “green” jobs in 2007 – nearly twice as many as in the coal industry. Montana ranks fifth  in the nation for wind-energy potential. Even China has been dramatically increasing its use of renewables and recently called for the closing of thousands of small coal mines by 2015. Perhaps most telling, Goldman Sachs recently stated that investment in coal infrastructure is “a risky bet and could create stranded assets.”

The Answer May Be Blowing in the Wind

The Crow nation has possibly l5,000-megawatts of wind power potential, or six times as much power as is presently being generated by Colstrip. Michaelynn Hawk and Peregoy have an idea: a wind project owned by Crow Tribal members that could help diversify Crow income. Michaelynn says “the price of coal has gone down. It’s not going to sustain us. We need to look as landowners at other economic development to sustain us as a tribe. Coal development was way before I was born. From the time I can remember, we got per capita from the mining of coal. Now that I’m older, and getting into my elder age, I feel that we need to start gearing towards green energy.”

Imagine there were buffalo, wind turbines and revenue from the Yellowtail Dam to feed the growing Crow community. What if the Crow replaced some of that 500 megawatts of Colstrip Power, with some of the l5,000 possible megawatts of power from wind energy? And then there is the dam on the Big Horn River. “We have the opportunity right now to take back the Yellowtail Dam,” Peragoy says. “Relicensing and lease negotiations will come up in two years for the Crow Tribe, and that represents a potentially significant source of income – $600 million. That’s for 20 years, $30 million a year.”

That would be better than dirty coal money for the Crow, for the Lummi, for all of us.