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Galore Creek Collapse Provides Lessons for Alaska
Chris Zimmer : Dec 3.2007
With the Galore Creek mine dead in the water, British Columbia’s plans for an electrical line into the Stikine region are also now in question. Investor confidence in the BC mining industry has been shaken, while the problems of mining companies underestimating costs and relying on faulty feasibility studies are in the spotlight. People and communities that bet on the promises of Galore Creek will take a hit. Alaska should heed several key lessons from this situation.
First, Alaska should develop its own sustainable energy strategy that promptly gets Southeast Alaska communities off expensive, dirty diesel power. Alaskans should not pin hopes on wishful mega-projects like constructing an electrical intertie from Southeast Alaska to the BC transmission line now under question. With no BC line to connect to it is an intertie to nowhere.
Second, Galore is an example of how these projects are often much less than what they appear to be and that the mining industry’s economic predictions are often wrong. Communities should very, very carefully weigh promises from mining companies against economic realities like rising development costs and against the existing fisheries, hunting and tourism economies that mines can negatively impact.
Third, Alaskans should take a hard and skeptical look at Redcorp Ventures’ Tulsequah Chief mine and the hoverbarge access proposal. Redcorp is facing several of the same rising costs that hurt Galore, yet Redcorp has not redone its feasibility study in light of this. What if Redcorp goes belly up in the midst of the project, leaving a legacy of toxic acid mine drainage and harm to salmon and salmon fishermen? Redcorp needs to demonstrate that its project is still economically feasible or they should stop wasting everyone’s time and money.
Fourth, Alaska should take the time needed to fully review the hoverbarge proposal and determine if Redcorp is actually capable of operating in an environmentally safe way in the Taku. Their track record of failing to stop ongoing acid mine pollution at the Tulsequah Chief does not inspire confidence. Their financial situation is in question. Evidence that the hoverbarge poses serious risks to salmon and wildlife is growing. And, in a slap in the face to the Alaskan public, Redcorp is submitting its permit applications a week before Christmas, forcing the public comment period through the Christmas and New Year’s holidays.
Enough is enough. Alaska should enforce a moratorium on permitting of the Tulsequah Chief and its hoverbarge until a bi-national watershed plan is developed that gives Alaska guarantees that our fisheries and other interests in the Taku will be protected.