Obama Rally in Marquette, MI, Thursday, February 10!

Join the Upper Peninsula Coalition for Clean Water outside the Vandament Arena (PEIF) at noon, anticipating Obama’s speech scheduled for 1:20 pm.  Parking is available in the Lakeview/YMCA lot. Parking  lots located north of the Dome are also open, however, other lots around the Dome are restricted. We will rally along Fair Ave. in front of the Berry Events Center.  Look for the BLUE WATER FLAGS and spirited people!

Bring signs and flags – WELCOME OBAMA! -“Protect our Water”, “Clean Water Forever,” “Five Great! One Superior!” “Water is Life” and more. We will have extra signs.

It would be great to show our local support in welcoming our President of the United States where his Inaugural exhortation to the nation was: “Let Clean Waters Flow” !

President Barack Obama’s appearance at NMU on Thursday, Feb. 10, will be an invitation-only event in Vandament Arena geared primarily toward NMU students. According to the White House Office of Media Affairs, Obama will deliver remarks on the National Wireless Initiative. Prior to the event in Vandament, the president will see a demonstration of how NMU’s WiMAX network has enabled distance learning for university and community students and meet with local business owners who have used broadband access to grow their businesses.

Rally On!

The Upper Peninsula Coalition for Clean Water

Water Ad SWUP 2-10

Canadian panel OKs nuclear shipment on Great Lakes: Reaction from the Environmental Community

Updated: Saturday, February 05, 2011, 2:21 AM

By The Associated Press

TRAVERSE CITY — A Canadian agency on Friday approved sending a shipment of 16 scrapped power generators with radioactive contents across three of the Great Lakes, turning aside objections that the risk of an accidental spill was too great.

The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission said it would grant a transport license to Bruce Power Inc., which plans to send the generators — each the size of a school bus — to Sweden for recycling. The company says the shipment will be safe and its plan is ecologically sound.

“We always believed this was the right thing to do to reduce our environmental footprint and we are pleased the soundness of our case has been verified,” said Duncan Hawthorne, president and CEO of the company, which is based in Kincardine, Ontario.

Bruce Power said previously the shipment would take place this spring. On Friday, the company said it would discuss future steps after obtaining permission from all governments with jurisdiction over portions of its route, including the U.S., the United Kingdom, Denmark and Norway.

The Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, a coalition representing more than 70 mayors in the region, said it was disappointed and would consider its options for continuing to fight the shipment.

“We feel this sets a very bad and dangerous precedent for the future, especially with the amount of nuclear power around the Great Lakes,” said David Ullrich, the group’s director.

The shipment would depart from a port on Lake Huron’s Owen Sound and traverse Lakes Erie and Ontario, plus the St. Lawrence River, before reaching the Atlantic Ocean.

Each of the 100-ton generators has about 4,200 metal tubes that contained hot water, which created steam that powered electricity-producing turbines. Thirty-two of the boilers were taken out of service in the 1990s.

Bruce Power last year awarded a $37 million contract to Studsvik, a Swedish company, to melt down the generators and sell the metal as scrap. About 90 percent of the material can be recycled; the rest will be too radioactive and will be returned for permanent storage.

The company plans two shipments of 16 generators each.

Bruce Power says each generator has less than an ounce of radioactive material and would be welded shut to prevent leaks.

The nuclear safety commission said the company’s plan complies with international regulations and poses “negligible” risk to human health and the environment.

Ullrich said the panel’s risk assessment was based on assumptions most favorable to the shipment and did not appear to consider dangers in the St. Lawrence River, where water levels are lower than in the Great Lakes. Two vessels spilled oil in the river last summer after running aground, he said.

Media Release – For Immediate Release February 5, 2011

READ  – Decision allowing Transport of Radioactive Waste Condemned

2011 0206 The Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility REACTION

Back by Popular Demand: Lois Gibbs

A viewing and discussion of Lois Gibbs’ riveting presentation given last October at NMU will take place at the

Federated  Women’s Clubhouse beginning at 7:00 pm, Tuesday, February 15th

Gibbs, Executive Director of the Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ) together with Peter Sessa, Boston Attorney and Activist and CHEJ Board Member, will be connected via phone to the event and look forward to participating in the discussion.  For more information call 228-4444.

Homemade pies will be available for sampling and purchasing.

If you would like to donate or purchase a pie, call 228-4444.

Print and distribute this fine poster Encore-Lois 7 sponsors

Visit Center for Health, Environment and Justice website,   www.chej.org

Opinion: Kennecott Trucking

Peshekee Road: A cautionary tale gives perspective

January 23, 2011 by Jon Saari http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/558055/Another-opinion.html?nav=5003

In 1890-1892 the Iron Range and Huron Bay Railroad built a mine hauling railroad along what is now called the Peshekee Grade/County Road 607. As recounted in an enterprising history by Robert D. Dobson, this venture was designed to link the Champion Mine with an ore dock on Huron Bay, a distance of about 40 miles.

Fifteen hundred workers laid the tracks and blasted cuts through the rocks, but the project failed miserably. Engineers had underestimated the steepness of the slopes descending to Lake Superior, and steam locomotives were unable to negotiate the climb or the descent. It became the Railroad to Nowhere.

The chief engineer fled to Mexico, the workers went unpaid, the ore dock was dismantled and the rolling stock sold. But the failed railroad eventually became the main route of a gravel road that facilitated modest development in the western part of the Michigamme Highlands: camper associations, second homes and logging.

Most of the land stayed wild and undeveloped. Parts of it became protected wilderness areas: Craig Lake State Park and the federal McCormick Tract. As late as the 1990s, it was possible to buy whole sections of land with undeveloped lakes on them – a rarity anywhere in the lower 48.

Kennecott’s Eagle Mine lies about 12 miles east of the Peshekee Grade. Some area residents imagine that a new, little settlement may grow up around it, like the mining locations of the past. The mine and a new proposed North-South road, so the storyline went, would open up the back country to development: a few stores, a bar, maybe a resort or motel.

But I think this is an illusion. This alternative mine haul road, officially cancelled by Kennecott this week, would likely have barely outlasted the mine, which has a projected life of 6-8 years and no guarantees beyond that.

A better image of that haul road’s likely future would be today’s Peshekee Grade: created by an inflated vision of usefulness, it has become a step-child of the Road Commission, abandoned to the bruising elements of wintertime ice and snow, freeze and melt. The Kennecott Highway would have become an expensive Road to Nowhere.

This region stayed undeveloped because the land is harsh and inhospitable to inattentive humans, including engineers, investors and recreators. Snowmobilers better be thickly clothed and fully fueled when they head out across it, and even then they are running risks.

I met a man in L’Anse who was once snowmobiling along the headwaters of the Peshekee when his machine broke through the surface; he had unknowingly been sledding on top of the tag alders, on six feet of compacted snow!

At a public hearing on the North-South Highway, a Township Supervisor once remarked that the extensive McCormick wilderness should be “enough playground” for us silent-sport environmentalists. He misses the point. It’s not primarily about recreation or scenic beauty, but prizing intact ecosystems, appreciating their contributions for healthy populations of native plants and animals, and not degrading them.

To protect its intact ecosystems, the U.P. cannot be a few islands of wildness. It needs bio-gems as core areas, but the linking corridors and buffer zones are really the key to long term sustainability. These are areas of mixed usage, of working forests and backwoods camp culture and recreational trails. Here we must be particularly careful when we add a road, a trail, a power line, a pit or a mine.

The small changes do add up, inexorably. Will the “next generation” of natural resource users, in particular non-ferrous mining and biomass energy projects, get it right? Don’t expect Rio Tinto or even the DNR/DEQ to speak up for the best and highest uses of the land. Be part of the watchdog movement over industry and government that offers a hope that this place we call home will remain special for a long time.

Editor’s note: Jon Saari is a retired Northern Michigan University professor and member of the Upper Peninsula Environmental Coalition.

From Teresa Bertossi:  http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/558089/Bad-planning-here.html?nav=5067

And from the Editor of the Mining Journal:      http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/558053/Kennecott-move-to-halt-road-work-is-regrettable.html?nav=5003

Headwaters News:  http://headwatersnews.net/feature/mining-road-plan-must-have-public-priorities-not-rio-tinto-profits-in-mind/

Opinion: Professors, knowledge and the politics of mining

December 19, 2010 – Jon Saari, as published in the Mining Journal

University professors occupy an unusual niche in American society. I speak from the experience of having been one for 34 years at Northern Michigan University.

Professionals by virtue of their long and specialized graduate training, professors are considered an educated elite, and looked up to by many.

But disdainful critics see only too-smart experts and intellectuals.

Our democratic noses sniff out patronizing and smug attitudes. Yet we often enjoy demeaning caricatures of our supposed ” betters” as well as our “inferiors.” Along with the greedy fat capitalist and the baby-kissing conniving politician is the figure of the bumbling professor who is hopelessly out of touch with reality.

The truth is professors are interested in much more than the real world. Take the concept of profit and loss. It means the bottom line to a corporate executive, or the keys to electoral victory to a politician.

The university community fairly hums with multiple perspectives on the concept: economists theorize about externalized costs, linguists trace the changing meanings of the word “profit,” historians construct portraits of economic life in different cultures and eras, and philosophers look at the logic and consistency of our use of the terms.

Stop, you say! Just give me a common sense definition. But reality has many faces in the university, and in becoming educated we learn to try them all on, like dancers putting on masks at a ball.

Such reality testing is at the heart of what professors do; we are trained not to be cogs in a machine, but critical thinkers who take very little at face value. But however much Americans praise free-thinking, many of us actually prefer like-thinking.

Conservative parents are horrified that their daughter has a Marxist professor, corporate clients want research that produces results favorable to their interests, and legislators often want to run universities like businesses.

Because of these pressures, special traditions have evolved around universities to protect them as sanctuaries for free inquiry. On principle, parents and legislators are held at arms length from the classroom, and professors (after five-to-seven years probation) are granted career-long tenure that can only be ended for serious misconduct or demonstrated incompetence.

In recent years, the mining controversy in our region has drawn NMU faculty into its vortex. At least five faculty members (three retired, including this writer) have been active opponents of the Eagle Project on the Yellow Dog Plains, while a number of others have seen it as an opportunity for professional research, even collaboration with a new multinational mining corporation.

Such diverse reactions are to be expected in an academic subculture of free thinkers and professional entrepreneurs.

But one recent collaboration between two NMU faculty members and Kennecott Eagle Mineral Company has a number of observers raising their eyebrows.

Tawni Ferrarini (Economics) and Marcelo Siles (International Studies), as independent contractors, have undertaken a study of community attitudes for Kennecott.

The first phase was completed during the summer of 2010, and utilized a SWOT analysis, which stands for an analysis of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats related to new mining in parts of Marquette and Baraga counties. A second phase is being launched.

The main scholarly concern is that Kennecott is a client paying for this research study. It wants the information, and will ultimately use it as part of a strategy for building ties in this community.

To their credit, the researchers and their focus groups turned up perceived weaknesses and threats, even though opponents were excluded in phase one. But other problems remain.

Ferrarini and Siles emphasize that they are not representing NMU in this study, but in fact the credibility of the study rests on their degrees and university affiliation.

It would have been more transparent and convincing if it had been funded by NMU research monies instead of KEMC community outreach funds.

Editor’s note: Jon Saari is a retired Northern Michigan University professor and member of the Upper Peninsula Environmental Coalition.

Also read Thomas Polkinghorne’s letter to the editor concerning the controverial Kennecott haul road:

http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/556865/Changes-are-coming.html?nav=5067

Student Environmental Coalition Fights to ‘Save the Wild U.P.’

By ANYA ZENTMEYER | Grand Valley Lanthorn

Updated: December 5, 2010, 8:31 PM


Katie Sexton, president of the Student Environmental Coalition, poses for a photograph at “Save the Wild Up” hosted by the SEC


Bounded by three of the five great lakes as well as the St. Mary’s river, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan is most frequently noted for its abundance of wilderness and wildlife.

The stillness and sanctuary “above the bridge” is rivaled only by the looming threat of ecological destruction due to the increasing trend of sulfide mining not only in the UP, but across the entire Lake Superior basin.

President of Grand Valley State University’s Student Environmental Coalition (SEC), Katie Sexton, is hoping to help the U.P.‘s modest man power in the process of gaining momentum, educating and informing Michigan’s students about the metallic sulfide mining process.

“People in the UP lack the numbers to create a strong political opposition to this mine, and this organization is a way of getting other Michiganders, environmentalists, and people concerned with the basic human right to fresh, clean water concerned about the threats that these mining projects pose,” Sexton said.

At an event hosted by the SEC on Nov. 30, guest speaker Sara Culvers of the citizen-based organization Save the Wild U.P. held a video showing and discussion on the dangers of metallic sulfide mining, which can introduce contamination to Lake Superior that will take 190 years to cycle through.

“Our Great Lakes make up at least 18% of the planet’s fresh water,” Culvers said. “We are losing fresh water at a dizzying pace and in the words of a Marquette physician, ‘You’re rolling the dice if you put a mine next to this lake.’”

GVSU junior and ‘Yooper’ Kelsey Mackie heard Culvers speak and said that although she called the wilderness above her home, she never realized the importance of it until now.

“Growing up in the Upper Peninsula, I took living on the shore of Lake Superior and having the opportunity to explore the surrounding wilderness for granted,” she said. “But after learning about the sulfide mines endangering the ecosystem of my home, I was actually outraged.”

Currently, the Save the U.P. anti-sulfide mining efforts have zeroed in on Kennecott Minerals – a wholly-owned subsidiary of world mining giants Rio Tinto – that Sexton said has a history of poor mine structure that often leads to severe water pollution and damage to surrounding ecosystems.

The metallic sulfide mining process extracts valuable metals like gold, nickel and copper from a sulfide ore body of which are prevalent along the 1,700 miles of U.P. shoreline. Extraction of the metals releases sulfur that when oxidized (mixed with water and oxygen) produces fragrant sulfuric acid that turns streams orange, kills plants and wildlife and is long term and irreversible.

In pursuit of the sulfide rock ore -which contains several billions of dollars worth of nickel – Kennecott is pushing to begin mining under the Salmon Trout River with the mine’s entrance site at Eagle Rock – a sacred site of worship to the native Ojibwa tribe, who make up a substantial portion of the population along the Keweenaw Peninsula.

“Blowing up Eagle Rock for mining is the same thing as blowing up a church to them,” Sexton said.

Aside from potential sacrilege and water contamination, Culvers said that all plants and animals species in the area will be drastically and adversely impacted by the metallic sulfide mine, including the endangered Brook Trout.

“If this goes through, my grandchildren will not have the joy of seeing their grandchildren frolicking on the clean beaches of Lake Superior or splashing in the Yellow Dog River any more than we can enjoy the waters of the Grand River,” she said.

Although Kennecott received permits from state agencies to begin mining in Michigan under Michigan’s sulfide mining regulations – which the Save the Wild U.P. website maintains are “weak and untested” – the permits are currently being contested by the Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, Huron Mountain Club, Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, and the National Wildlife Federation.

It’s not just Kennecott who has big plans, either. Culvers said that a number of other big ticket mining companies are in the process of detailing plans in hopes to turn the U.P. into a comprehensive “mining district” that would stretch from the far eastern tip of Minnesota, passing through Wisconsin and the center of the U.P. and continue on down under the waters of Lake Michigan.

“If these mines are built, the entire U.P. will be another Appalachia: ruined land, poisoned waters, and an impoverished society,” Culvers said.

To combat criticism, the network of mining agencies is emphasizing job creation in the face of an exhausted economy. Culvers said that because “no politician wants to seem anti-job,” big business sulfide mining is receiving growing support from a number of politicians and representatives.

The most effective way to fight back, Sexton said, is by “getting a critical mass of concerned citizens to influence decisions made by legislators, officials, and ultimately those individuals who will be making the decisions about the mine and its operating procedures,” or more simply put – political lobbying.

By writing into state legislators as well as the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and US Department of Natural Resources, college students can be pivotal in influencing future legislation.

“College students have the educational resources and ability to cause a shift in the mining trend. It is important that we fulfill these responsibilities,” Sexton said. “And with the growing human population and diminishing sources of freshwater, accelerating the water crisis is something that has the potential to become very real to them later in life.” news@lanthorn.com

Published December 5, 2010 in News

The Facts in the Case: How Kennecott and the MDEQ are Overriding Michigan’s Mining Laws

by Lillian Marks Heldreth

If anyone is wondering why people continue to protest Kennecott’s Eagle Mine Project, or why litigation is ongoing despite the fact that we are repeatedly told it’s a “done deal,” the reason is simple: the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) and Kennecott have together managed to circumvent and ignore Michigan’s mining and environmental protection laws as well as applicable federal statutes.

Both Kennecott and the state claim that we are protected by these laws, but because they have chosen not to obey them, the miners, the environment, and our citizens are without any protection whatsoever from what promises to be a disaster, the scope of which ranges from “very bad” to “the BP of the Great Lakes.”

Because to our knowledge the full scope of these violations has never been published in one place in any of the public media, we consider it our civic duty to reveal them here, as clearly and as simply as we can.

OUR SOURCE

Most of our information is drawn from a 100-page brief filed on July 23, 2010 in Washtenaw County Circuit Court.  It appeals the Final Determination Order of the MDEQ, which upholds the permit granted to Kennecott Eagle Minerals Company under the provisions of Part 632 of Michigan’s Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Act.

This brief summarizes testimony from all previous litigation in the case, and clearly demonstrates that essential provisions of the law were bypassed while compelling scientific evidence was ignored.

This brief does NOT call for an end to sulfide mining efforts in Michigan. It calls for fair, honest enforcement of Part 632 of our State’s duly instituted mining code and federal codes. It asks that Kennecott’s operation be required to meet the stipulations of Michigan’s laws.

“Kennecott’s proposed Eagle Mine,” the brief charges, “stands poised to combine, here in the Great Lakes System, elements of recent West Virginia and Utah mine disasters with the catastrophe of the Gulf oil spill. As oil is to the waters of the gulf of Mexico, sulfuric acid and heavy metals like nickel, copper and arsenic could be to Lake Superior if, as predicted, the proposed mine or treatment systems fail.”

The brief details how Part 632 of Michigan’s law is expressly designed to minimize the known damaging effects of nonferrous (anything but iron) metallic sulfide mining, which, if not properly controlled, according to the law, “can cause significant damage to the environment, impact human health, and degrade the quality of life of the impacted community.”

NO LEGAL ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT

Part 632 requires an applying company to provide in advance an Environmental Impact Assessment, with detailed natural resource information for the entire potentially affected area outside the mining area. It must include data on land surface, surface water, ground water, air resources, resident plants, animals, insects, and birds, and must provide benchmarks for evaluating a later dates the mine’s impact in the environment.

Kennecott did not do this study. Instead, during previous litigation, Kennecott persuaded the Administrative Law Judge and the agency effectively to read the word “potential” out of the statute, and to declare that the mining operation would have “no adverse environmental effects outside the fence line.”

Thus, any effects downstream, downwind, or in the surrounding water table or to wildlife outside the fence are effectively eliminated from any need for consideration. –Or, we assume, from cleanup responsibility as well.

If so, that neat bit of finagling must be saving Kennecott millions or billions in potential liability and cleanup costs. But the rest of us can’t drink money.

A FATALLY FLAWED DESIGN

By ignoring 300 safety warnings, officials of Massey Coal, another English Multinational, saved themselves the cost of adequate ventilation systems, effectively killing 28 miners by suffocation and/or methane gas explosion in April, 2010. We’d call that murder, for they were repeatedly warned.

Unfortunately, Kennecott, too, has been warned, and advised by experts whom its agents chose to ignore, to change the design of this mine.

“Kennecott and the agency [MDEQ] have also steadfastly refused to take into account the overwhelming concerns from experts on all sides of the contested case that the proposed mine, as designed, would be unstable and likely to collapse.”

Five experts essentially agreed, even though the data they were given were supplied by Kennecott, and were presumably the most favorable Kennecott had to offer. But the experts knew their subject well, pointing out that Kennecott’s designers had used an outmoded method of calculation, and had not taken into consideration any of the local geologic characteristics, including a great deal of shale in the “crown pillar” (roof of the main shaft), a fault line, an intrusive dike, or any horizontal stress. (We note that shale tends to slide sideways).

Nor had Kennecott’s team accounted for the fact that the crown pillar would be under the Salmon Trout River and would be wet, greatly increasing the chance for slippage and failure.

Part 632 of Michigan’s law specifically requires a contingency plan for the potential of a collapse. Kennecott hasn’t shown one.

DISASTROUS CONSEQUENCES OF COLLAPSE

The consequences of such a collapse are horrific. Jack Parker, a recognized mining engineer and industry consultant, has also testified that the mine is likely to collapse, and that if the crown pillar collapses entirely, the Salmon Trout River would be sucked all the way down into the cavity itself. In another report, Mr. Parker also maintains that because of factors inherent in the faulty design, no workers could escape from the mine alive in the event of collapse or mine fire. Mr. Parker expects that collapse would also likely result in fire.

We can see only one reason for insisting on a plan that mining experts consider to be highly dangerous. It’s quicker and therefore cheaper, which means higher profits, but arguable at a potential cost in human life.

We also note that the recent Chilean mine collapse, which trapped 33 miners underground for several months and cost a tremendous amount in rescue efforts, has been attributed to flaws in the mine’s design, also due to cost-cutting efforts.

ENVIRONMENTAL CONSEQUENCES OF THE MINE’S OPERATION

Here we think it best to quote directly from the brief’s summary. As Kennecott has done no environmental studies, the plaintiffs called reputable scientists to testify in previous hearings. We have deleted specificreferences for readability, but they may be found on our website:

1. Dr. John Ejnik testified that the entire Salmon Trout River will be polluted from the mine at levels that will destroy aquatic life.

2. Dr. David Flaspohler detailed respects in which operations on the immediate physical facility will produce impacts far beyond the property lines or the facility boundary lines:

a. Truck traffic will have an effect on wildlife along the roads.

b. Road dust generated by heavy traffic on an unpaved road will settle into snow, and affect area wildlife after snow melt.

c. The deposition of heavy metals will be spread over tens of kilometers and enter both land and water.

d. Water running off the roads and off the facility itself will introduce heavy metals and sulfuric acid into surrounding habitats.

e. Pulses of copper, nickel and sulfur in the spring snow melt will enter the Salmon Trout River and be carried all the way “out into Lake Superior.” (Emphasis added)

f. Not only will the operation of the mine have negative effects extending “for miles from the mine footprint,” it is “likely to impair or destroy wildlife in the area of the mine and extending well beyond the property boundaries.”

3.Dr. Paul Adamus testified that at the minimum three-foot drawdown predicted by Kennecott’s consultant, Geomatrix, wetlands-dependent plants and animals would totally disappear for an entire one-mile radius.

4.Dr. Kerry Woods testified that the wildlife of the Huron Mountain Club, including its birds and large mammals, would all be disrupted by the development of the Eagle mine.

5.Dr. Mac Strand testified that a substantial drawdown of groundwater in the upper Salmon Trout River would impair or destroy the River’s entire ecosystem.

6.Based on published literature showing serious contamination of rivers as much as 40 miles downstream from polluting mine sites, Dr. Strand concluded that the metal contamination of the headwaters will have negative impacts all the way to the river’s mouth.

7.Expert ornithologist Alec Lindsay testified that the proposed mine would almost certainly adversely affect bird populations in both the Yellow Dog Plains and the Huron Mountain Club.

8. Kennecott’s expert, William Taylor, a leading expert in landscape ecology, was insistent that the entire Salmon Trout River needed to be studied in order to understand any part of the Salmon Trout River. He believes that the entire region must be studied, rather than stopping at boundary lines, in order to understand the potential effect of human disturbance. In particular, fish populations and communities must be viewed in the context of the entire watershed.”

The brief examines at length such obvious oversights as lack of any consideration for the Kirtland’s warblers, spruce grouse, or any insects, fungi, reptiles, salamanders, or plants.

GROUNDWATER DRAWDOWN=ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION

“Every expert who testified on the subject, including Kennecott’s wetlands expert, agreed that damage to area wetlands would implicate the health of the entire Salmon Trout River.” Aquatic ecologist Dr. Mac Strand stated “that a substantial drawdown of groundwater in the upper Salmon Trout River would impair or destroy the River’s entire ecosystem.”

We conclude that this dooms the only Coaster Brook Trout population in the contiguous United States. Sulfuric acid, the ultimate by-product of acid mine drainage, simply sterilizes streams.

There is more: the brief details a violated treaty and specific violations of environmental law, which lack of space prohibits our reporting in one article. We encourage readers to remember: “It’s not over ‘til it’s over.”

The full text of this brief may be found at K_TBrief_on_Appeal_-_FINAL

We encourage ALL interested citizens to inform themselves, be proud of our lawmakers, and call for full enforcement of our laws.

Note: the petitioners in this case are as follows:

NATIONAL WILDLIFE FEDERATION, KEWEENAW BAY INDIAN COMMUNITY, YELLOW DOG WATERSHED PRESERVE, INC. and HURON MOUNTAIN CLUB.

Lois Gibbs Inspires a Community

Nobel nominee gives speech

Also, watch video by Greg Peterson by clicking

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTK4NBzy4JQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ml1Si6MhiJc

Grassroots community efforts can sometimes be the turning point in battling big corporations over environmental and safety issues, said Lois Gibbs, the executive director of the Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ).

Gibbs spoke at NMU in Jamrich 102 on Friday, Oct. 15. Her presentation, “From the Love Canal to Michigan,” was sponsored by Students for Sustainable Living, among other groups, and focused on environmental action on a local level, with special regard to the controversial Kennecott Eagle Rock Mining Project.

Lois Gibbs, pictured on the left with Nicole Fisher, visited the Eagle Rock Mine Project during her trip to Marquette. Gibbs gathered in front of the mine with students in a silent protest. she presented her personal story of New York’s Love Canal on Friday Oct. 15. Gibbs promotes environmental activism projects nationwide. // Photo courtesy of Greg Peterson

Gibbs, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee, has appeared on television shows such as 20/20, Good Morning America, and The Oprah Winfrey Show to present her strategies on local environmental action and to share her personal story on how she became involved in environmental activism through her experiences with the historic environmental catastrophe of Love Canal.

Gibbs did not originally intend to be an environmental activist. Her life’s aspiration was to start a family in her hometown of Niagra Falls, NY.

“What I wanted to be was a mom. I wanted to have lots of babies,” she said.

After getting married and having her first child in the ‘70s, Gibbs became concerned when her son Michael was diagnosed with asthma and had dangerous bouts with pneumonia on a weekly basis. Gibbs and others began noticing an increasing trend of birth defects in newborns in the town, and when her second child was diagnosed with leukemia, Gibbs knew something was wrong. Gibbs found out that 56 percent of children in Niagra Falls were born with severe birth defects.

“I knew that if I didn’t stand up and if I didn’t do something that my children were going to die,” she said.

Little known to members of the community, the town of Niagra Falls had been built on a filled-in canal called the Love Canal that contained 20,000 tons of toxic waste. The dump contained traces of dioxin, the most toxic chemical known to man. The EPA had originally approved containment facilities for the toxic waste and deemed the area safe to live, but, despite precautionary measures, the waste leaked into the groundwater supply.  Gibbs and the community fought with the New York State and national governments through local political efforts and managed to secure evacuation for the town’s 833 families who were affected by the environmental hazards of the area.

“To win these battles, you need to fight with politics,” Gibbs said.

Gibbs found success in her personal struggle by rallying support door to door and pressuring elected officials with bad publicity.

When Gibbs realized that no local, state or national organization existed to advise environmental community action groups, she went on to found the CHEJ to organize communities that are in situations similar to her own and help promote a change in environmental policies.

“Whatever you’re fighting for, there are probably a lot of people out there who are with you. A lot of people who would take a stand, but they just don’t know what to do,” Gibbs said.

The struggle of Love Canal is similar to the struggle that environmental organizations in the UP are facing with the Kennecott Eagle Rock Mining project, Gibbs said. She made it clear that she is not against the mine specifically, but she is worried that information presented to the community about the mine’s safety could possibly be misleading.

“Why is it that the state of Michigan hasn’t done a study to check and make sure that in fact the data that the mining company is (correct)? I’m not anti-mine, I’m anti-poison. Maybe it is a safe mine, but frankly, we don’t know,” she said.

Gibbs was also invited to speak at Marquette Senior High School about her victory at the Love Canal, but when she was asked not to speak about the Kennecott mine, she declined the opportunity to speak, said Gibbs.

Kathryn O’Donnell, a member of Students for Sustainable Living, said the speech was informative, and may lend guidance for organizations who are against the Kennecott Mine in the UP.

“She really gave a lot of direction and examples on good plans that may work,” O’Donnell said.

The message Gibbs said was the most important was that anyone can be effective in creating change if they only stand up for themselves and fight for it.

“I am just a housewife. We were able to bring the president of the U.S. to stand in our high school auditorium to give us what we wanted. It was because we had a plan and a strategy,” Gibbs said.

Mining Journal Coverage:

http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/554571/Activist–tells-how-to-battle-polluters.html

Read also , a recent letter to the editor concerning the Marquette Senior High School’s decision to disallow discussion of Kennecott/Rio Tinto:

http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/555468/Speaker-at-MAPS.html?nav=5067