MARQUETTE — Save the Wild U.P. (SWUP) has submitted written comment to Michigan’s Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), after reviewing the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit #MI0006114 for Copper Range Co. (White Pine Mine). SWUP is deeply concerned that the permit lacks enforcement. The permit conditions appear insufficiently protective of aquatic life, given the well-documented and devastating history of legacy mining contamination at the Copper Range Co. (White Pine Mine) facility. The hydrological and ecological health of the surrounding Mineral River watershed, including the receiving waters listed in the permit (Perch Creek), have been ecologically impaired. Human-wrought landscape changes have permanently altered the watershed, to the point that Perch Creek now exists only to receive untreated wastewater discharges —that is, it has a “flow” volume of 0.

The industrial discharges authorized by this permit play a well-established role in transporting pollutants to Lake Superior, including contaminants such as chloride and copper. Given the long-term and ongoing nature of these discharges — mine dewatering without end, brines containing toxic amounts of metals and salts, and the lack of a industrial wastewater treatment facility — SWUP raised several key concerns.

First, the NPDES permit is intended to be an enforceable tool for maintaining surface water quality, however, this permit lets the polluter “report” contaminants rather than setting strict limits for copper (“report only” through 2018), dissolved copper, total hardness, total organic carbon, acute toxicity, chronic toxicity, total suspended solids, total chlorides, outfall observations, mercury, arsenic, cadmium — all of these contaminants are listed as “report” only. Given the egregious history of this facility, chloride in particular needs to be tightly controlled.

Second, the permit’s “allowable” copper levels appear detrimental to the Mineral River aquatic ecosystems; this watershed is already identified by the State of Michigan as “impaired” by copper. Impaired waters are those identified as “not attaining all designated uses” according to Section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act.

Third, it is unclear what percentage of leachate — water contaminated by contact with toxic metals — is allowable in the final effluent discharge. This NPDES permit authorizes the discharge of “mine dewatering” (brine water), “leachate from an on-site repository” (slag from historic copper milling or smelting), and “stormwater runoff.”  The actual amount of stormwater runoff is unspecified, but “until the expiration date of this permit, the permittee is authorized to discharge an unspecified amount of stormwater runoff from lands on Michigan’s List of Environmental Contamination.”

Finally, a NPDES tool must be enforceable. Since this facility has no wastewater treatment plant, compliance can’t be enforced. While the permit would “add monitoring” for arsenic, cadmium, silver, the monitoring is “report only” so the prevention of pollution is not enforced.

Mining at the site began in 1879. Historically, the White Pine Mine facility polluted the Mineral River (via Perch Creek) and Lake Superior with industrial wastewater discharges containing toxic amounts of salts and metals. Discharges included tailings, contact water, and brine pumped from underground mine workings.  In 1983, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) conducted a study of the mine’s dewatering plume entering Lake Superior at the mouth of the Mineral River, and found levels of chloride at 2,000 mg/L, compared to natural levels of chloride in Lake Superior of 1 mg/L. This single source of pollution accounted for “35-40% of total US tributary load of chloride to Lake Superior.”

In 1989, the Michigan Department of Natural Resources (MDNR) stated that “flow in the Mineral River downstream of the Perch Creek confluence is primarily tailings impoundment effluent from the White Pine mine.” 1991, the MDNR described “macroinvertebrate abundance as low and much reduced” in the Mineral River due to the mine’s brine discharges. In 1992, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) visited the White Pine Mine, and noted that despite extensive tailings impoundment basins filled with mine effluent  — the tailings basins are visible from space — “no groundwater monitoring” was required at the site. It is now understood that brine rising in the former underground mine poses a critical threat to the local groundwater aquifer, so the mine (currently owned by Copper Range Co., pending purchase by Highland Copper) is required to continue dewatering.

Despite years of remediation efforts, the Mineral River is still being polluted by the White Pine facility. According to the EPA’s 2011 “Discharge Monitoring Report Pollutant Loading Tool,” the Mineral River is listed as a top receiving watershed for industrial effluent discharges, polluted by a staggering “total Toxic Weighted Pounds Equivalent” of 1,020 pounds per year of “ore mining and dressing” waste. This NPDES permit appears to facilitate an ongoing unregulated point-source of pollution to Mineral River and Lake Superior.

The Upper Peninsula is witnessing a resurgence in mining and mineral exploration which threatens multiple watersheds in the Lake Michigan and Lake Superior basins. This resurgence also threatens the treaty protected natural and cultural resources of federally-recognized tribal nations and highlights the state’s responsibility in maintaining government-to-government negotiations when these resources are threatened. Playing off the area’s history of economic boom-and-bust cycles, mining companies move in promising good jobs and a watchful eye to the environment — but mining and milling bring short-term profits at the expense of legacy environmental contamination. The White Pine mine site, and the NPDES permit currently under DEQ’s review, perfectly illustrate the long term environmental hazards of mining.

“The DEQ might as well build a drainage pipe from the northernmost tailings basin of the old White Pine Mine to the Lake Superior shoreline and have it done with. The facility authorized by this NPDES permit really has no water treatment plan, and no true “mixing zone” for effluent, given the low volume of the Mineral River. Let’s be honest: historically — and for the foreseeable future — this site is polluting Lake Superior,” said Alexandra Maxwell, SWUP’s executive director.

Founded in 2004, Save the Wild U.P. is a grassroots environmental organization dedicated to preserving the Upper Peninsula of Michigan’s unique cultural and environmental resources. For more information contact info@savethewildup.org or call (906) 662-9987. Get involved with SWUP’s work at savethewildup.org or follow SWUP on Facebook at facebook.com/savethewildup or Twitter @savethewildup.

Related Sources:

• EPA Mine Site Visit: Copper Range Company, White Pine Mine
• Google Map (for viewing Mineral River, Perch Creek, White Pine Mine tailings ponds)
• Environmental Justice Case Study: Solution Mining in White Pine, MI and the Bad River Reservation

The DEQ has extended the Public Comment period for the “Back Forty” sulfide mine permit application —new deadline is Tuesday, February 16, 2016.

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Save the Wild U.P. has formally asked the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) to extend the Public Comment period (currently set for February 2, 2016) for the mine permit application submitted to the DEQ for the Aquila Resources “Back Forty” sulfide mine project.

Save the Wild U.P. cites the following reasons for the request:

• Key environmental stakeholders — including tribal members, grassroots organizations and local residents — have reported a range of technical difficulties related to the mine permit application documents: confusions related to non-functioning or misleading URLs, poor functionality (ie: Tables of Contents without internal links), PDF compilation issues (causing viewer applications to randomly ‘skip’ pages while reading), excessive file size of individual PDF files (100MB+, and a single file containing more than 20,000 pages, crashing PDF readers or causing memory errors), residually copy-protected text, etcetera. Altogether, these represent inexcusable obstacles to public participation.
• The applicant did not submit their primary file — Mine Permit Application Volume I. — in a format usable to the public: the text was copy-protected. The DEQ was notified of this problem by Save the Wild U.P. on December 23rd, and to this date (January 6, 2016) no solution or explanation has been provided by the DEQ.
• Total file size is over 37,500 pages, not including an AQD “Permit to Install” (New Source Review) which is also in a public comment phase, but not included in DEQ links.
• Save the Wild U.P. was not notified by the DEQ when this mine permit application went to Public Notice.
• No information is provided concerning a key “land swap” proposed between Aquila Resources and the State of Michigan, for parcels critical to the mine permit application’s site design. The public has not been informed about the land swap. A direct question about the land swap, asked at the DEQ public meeting in Stephenson on January 5, 2016, could not be answered by the DEQ staff. Until the underlying “land swap” has been publicly reviewed, the mine permit application review should be put on hold.
• Numerous concerns have been raised about the ‘timing of the permit’ and while the DEQ may not have had control over the application’s original submission date, serious consideration must be given to the holidays, which resulted in DEQ staff being unavailable to resolve concerns in a timely fashion.
• New information, not disclosed in the permit application materials, is coming to light about the extent to which mapped archaeological resources of enormous cultural value are in the path of this project. The Back Forty mine application threatens to destroy, disrupt or inflict significant damage to Menominee Tribe’ treaty-protected natural and cultural resources. These damages are culturally offensive and unethical. It is in the State of Michigan’s best interest to grant stakeholders additional time for permit review, given the applicant’s apparent lack of full disclosure. The loss of these resources would reverberate well beyond any cultural or political boundaries.