You may not like the analogy but it’s much more accurate then fellas like you could or would ever admit. I won’t insult you by telling you to develop or use some common sense. This isn’t about common sense. It’s about ethics. I know where your ethics are. If you want them back, do the right thing: Send the check back to the Pebble mine folks. Pete my boy, there are better and more honest ways to make a living. Why don’t you choose one that doesn’t involve the destruction of what’s left of the natural world? If you do you will sleep better and your kids will actually be proud of you.

“We felt that if the EPA could apply its experience and good objective science, then the Watershed Assessment would surely present a more realistic view of the potential effects of mine development in southwest Alaska. We believed it would more realistically frame the issues of risk and reward, and correct the popular myth that a modern mine occupying less than one-twentieth of 1% of the land base, within a 400 square mile area that produces just one half of 1% of Bristol Bay sockeye salmon, could somehow wipe out an entire fishery.”

Just think about what he is saying here, the mine is occupying 1/20th of 1% of the land base that produces 1/2 of 1% of the salmon within the Bristol Bay fishery. Yet the environmental extremists have convinced people like you the mine is going to dig up southwest Alaska and pour it into Bristol Bay, killing all the salmon. Use some of the common sense you developed as a surveyor to see through the enviro smoke and mirrors.

Based upon some of the responses here, it looks like you have no other choice than to depopulate Vancouver and everything upstream in order to save the annual salmon run up the Fraser. I trust you will get on top of this pronto.

So here’s my questions for to you, Jack. Why the focus on gold? Do we ignore the copper because it’s easier to oppose the project since copper is the nerve system in any modern electricity using society and therefore harder to fight? Do we conviently ignore the fact that any renewable energy system is going to use copper and instead focus on the gold? Have we in the “West” decided that folks in these “developing” countries get to eat the costs/impacts of meeting these demands, or do we put in our fair share of product in order to meet the world’s needs.

Sounds to me like we have a lot of folks (including those in EPA and the NGOs) who want us to continue our practice of creating more landscape zoos to service the wealthy “western” folks who make donations and send money for “public service” campaigns.

http://www.minexconsulting.com/publications.html

Pebble is a massive ore deposit. It will be mined today, in two decades, or in two centuries. That is just resource economics. Other deposits will be exploited, depleted, and Pebble will look more attractive. There are very real and very serious risks involved. I trust the scientists and managers; and maybe I will be called an idiot for doing so – fair enough.

Alaska only manages 28% of its land. In comparison, the Federal Government manages 60% and Native Corporations 11%. The pebble deposit is located on those lands owned and managed by Alaska, AND designated for mineral exploration and development. If the Feds via EPA shutdown Pebble now, it would be unprecedented, and another signal that Alaska is an unfriendly district for Development. The Sierra Club, WWF, and others would love this!

I guess a new exploration model of the world is needed, where only certain types of deposits are amenable with certain demographics and environments. Or the BBNC could be bought off?

All industrial projects, mines, indeed- all human activity has some negative impact on our environment. Whether we need another mine, if it will damage the fisheries in a drastic (and who decides what is acceptable?) way, if the jobs it produces will outweight the jobs it may destroy – all of these are debatable to some degree.

I am not an Alaskan but I know a bunch. I would be PO’ed to have an ALASKAN down here telling me we couldn’t farm corn in Indiana because of farm runoff or we couldn’t have a factory somewhere else. I would likely agrees with them, but how is it their business? Let the people who live in the State have their say. The rest of us, as much as we may love Alaska and feel like it should be “our last frontier”, are just tourists.

While I oppose the Pebble Mine in conscience, it is up to the people of that state to decide.

Well stated…Pebble is simply incompatible with the existing resources of the area in question. Not a broad brush indictment of mining as a whole, but this mine in this place. The risks are real, and they’re too high.