Among key points: The redesigned Pebble Mine is smaller and no longer includes the Upper Talarik Watershed; The new mine plan includes eliminating cya- nide commonly used in gold extraction elsewhere and no permanent storage of tailings; Alaska’s high environmental controls and standards ensure Pebble will have far less impact than copper mines elsewhere in the world where environmental controls are lax or non-existent; The mine will have less impact than other mines because materials and ore will be transported by ferries rather than by truck on public roads; The project is designed to withstand the larg- est earthquakes, larger than any Alaska has expe- rienced In a region with few year-around, well-paid jobs, Pebble will employ up to 2,000 workers during construction and up to 850 during decades of pro- duction; and As is the place in many other boroughs in Alaska, the mine will be the largest taxpayer in the Lake and Peninsula Borough, with an estimated $21 million in taxes annually. Updates and more information are available at PebblePartnership.com.
404 wetlands fill application — a construction per- mit. As such, evaluating the likelihood of and po- tential consequences from a mine waste release is not in the Corps’ purview. That is a job for state Dam Safety Program officials and Pebble hasn’t yet applied for its tailings dam permits. McCoy said the Corps conducted a cursory review of spill risks given it was a prominent topic in the comments the agency received during the scoping phase of the EIS. “We did convene folks together for a very high-level spill risk scenarios that included the folks from Pebble, the folks from the state as well as AECOM’s specialists, but it’s at a much higher level than what would be required for an actual dam permit,” he said. AECOM is the third-party contractor compiling EIS data for the project. A final Pebble EIS is tentatively scheduled for De- cember of 2019. Pebble Limited Partnership has not yet complet- ed a preliminary economic assessment for the proj- ect, not required for the EIS. The Pebble Partnership has been holding infor- mational forums statewide to share the refinements that have been made in the mine’s design and plan, as well as refuting incorrection perceptions.
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January 2019
The Alaska Miner
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