Trout Unlimited is trying to kill Alaska

[Sourdough]

Thursday we had Alaska's sole US Congressman, Don Young come to lunch with my Hunting and Fishing crowd.  There was 18 people in attendence, and we all just had a round table discussion.  Back before Don became a Congressman, he worked for a member of our group selling Kawasaki ATVs in Fort Yukon, his home town here in Alaska.  So you can see he was amoungst friends and it was a very casual lunch discussion.  Anyway, one of the things Don told us is what Trout Unlimited is currently doing, trying to get the Pebble Mine stopped.  Don said if Trout Unlimited is successful we will lose Alaska.  There will go all mining, oil drilling, and construction.  No new roads, or rail roads.  No new bridges, nothing.

Trout Unlimited has requested the EPA to apply the Clean Water Act to stop the Pebble Mine here in Alaska.  This is a dangerous precidence, as we all know how the EPA once started on an issue keeps going and issues rediculous limits and standards, that are economically unattainable.  Look what they have done to coal power plants.  Look at the restrictions and their definition of wet lands.  Trout unlimited has requested EPA stop Pebble due to the possability of damage to the watershed.

Damage to water shed, OK anywhere you go in Alaska, or the lower 48 and Hawaii for that matter you are in a water shed.  Once the EPA determines that Pebble could possiably damage the water shed, and shuts Pebble down, the same can be said for all mines.  This one precidence can shut down all mining in Alaska and the US.  Now say an oil company wants to drill a new oil well in Oklahoma.  Some wacked out person that don't like oil wells goes to the EPA with a request for s study on the possiable affects to the water shed.  The oil well can be shut down.  Does not matter whether it is on private land or not.  (Obama does not want any new oil wells drilled remember) That well will be shut down, followed by applying that rule to all oil wells in the US.

Now a community decides to replace an aging bridge across some river.  Or the bridge gets washed away in a flood.  Now some little old lady decides she does not want a bridge there.  Or some environmental group does not want the bridge.  All they have to do is go to the EPA and have a Water Shed study done as to the possiability of damage to the water shed.  During construction the water would be disturbed making it turbid, damaging to fish.  Disapproved, you can't build or replace that bridge.

OK, now we get to a community that needs a new Hospital, a Shopping Mall, a Community Center, a Sports Stadium, or a New School.  Anybody like the people across the street from the new construction, or someone that does not like the contractor that gets the bid, can go to the EPA and request a Water Shed study.  Again there is a possiability that during or after construction damage could occur to the water shed, so construction is disapproved.

If the EPA goes there and you all know they will if they are not stopped.  We will have Trout Unlimited to blame.  They are the ones seeking to get the EPA involved using the Clean Water Act, to stop a Copper, Molybednium, Gold, and what else they happen to find mine.  There is the possability that Rare Earth Minerals can be found there as well.   

[BUGEYE]

another term by obama could spell the end of hunting and fishing in those scenic areas.

[leadbutt]

Thanks for another side of the story I have been following the story in the "Alaskan" mag now for a few months, and was just about ready to fire off letters to the Congress critters to help stop it, will have to set back and look a little harder at it.

[Rol Page]

I remember reading about Obummer's EPA closing down a rare earth minerals mine, I believe in California, thus greatly reducing the available supply, which was in China and driving up the price of minerals used in the production of solar units..  EPA should be restricted if not shut down completely until reasonable heads can prevail.  Since the days of dinasours the earth has been changing and no liberal do gooders are going to stop it.

[Sourdough]

leadbutt:  Please first of all get the real facts, not the BS being printed in magazines and being put out over the air by the Anti's.  We currently have large mines in operation all over the state.  None of these mines are polluting the environment.  Red Dog did have a problem a while back, but the state fined them heavily and they cleaned up all the contamination.  Ft Know has turned the stream they take water from to process the gold, into a much cleaner stream.  Ft Knox has removed all the naturally occuring arsonic, so fish can now live in that stream.  making it a great place to take the kids to catch Arctic Grayling.

All the lies being printed about Pebble are from a rich guy that lives in California and has a fishing lodge near the mining site.  He has mounted a multi million dollar campaign to stop the mine.  He got fined recently by the state of Alaska for contributing all the money to defeat a ballot initative.  More than was legal from a single doner.  Now he has gone to Trout Unlimited with his lies and convinced them the mine is a bad thing. 

Alaska needs this mine, and Alaska has the strictest mining restrictions in the nation.  We are not going to let some mining firm come in here and do damage to our bounitful wildlife.  Or Damage out eco system.  Not only does Alaska need the jobs this mine would bring, but the country needs the molybednium and copper.  This is the largest known copper deposit in the world. 

I've got to go right now but I will be back with more information on this mine. 

[Sourdough]

OK more information about Pebble.  Like with the Polar Bears, this is all a what if proposition.  Pebble is the largest Copper prospect currently in the world.  It is also rich in molybedinum, an alloy used in the making of steel.  There is Gold also in the area along with the Copper.  The more they drill exploritory holes the more they are finding.  This looks like it can be the richest mining area in North America. 

Now the area is in the Alaska Range of mountains, near Lake Clark, and north of Lake Illiamna.  Unlike what is being said on TV and in the papers and magazines there are no major rivers in the immediate area.  There is some creeks and small streams that do eventually run into some major rivers, but it is a long way down there.  This Rich guy is spreading so many lies about how they are going to build huge dams, and spread heavy metals into all the streams killing all the salmon and other fish in the streams.  He has been spreading these lies for over three years.  The applications for permits for mining were just turned in this winter.  The plans for mining have not been fully drawn up yet, let alone finalized.  Only an overview has been released. 

This guy that owns property near the mining site is 98% of the opposition to the mine.  He has paid some of the locals to come out and protest against the mine, but they are either indifferent of in the most part for the mine.  The young people of working age are deffinately for this project, they want the jobs.  This area is the poorest area of the state.  There are no jobs in the area.  The fishing that they claim will be lost are down in Bristol Bay a long way from Lake Clark.  This mine will bring over 2000 jobs to an economicly depressed area of the state.  The revenues would also bring monies into the state to replace the declining oil revenues the state is currently recieving.  Mining is expecting to last for at least 30 years, depending on what is found once the mining starts it may be decades longer.  It will also bring a means of transporting goods into the area besides air fraight.  Currently the only way to get people and goods into the area is by air.  The mine will be building a railroad from tidewater on Cook Inlet to the mining site.  Again bringing jobs into the area. 

This mine will also help spur the economy of the US, bring jobs to the makers of large mining equipment.  Those big drag lines, loaders, and dump trucks, that the operator has to climb a flight of stairs to get into.  Catapiller, LaTournou, and other us equipment makers.  Makers and suppliers of replacement parts like tires, oil filters, hydrolic lines, hoses, and any other parts needed to service this equipment.  All the standard pick-ups, trucks, forklifts, and equipment to run the repair shops needed for the big equipment.  The buildings that will have to be built to house the offices, dinning facilities, sleeping facilities, shops and maintenance buildings.  The cooks, electricians, carpenters, plumbers, and laborers needed to run a camp this size.  Equipment operators to operate small equipment to remove snow during the winter.  Along with managers, accountants, bookkeepers, clerks, secretaries, and everyone else to run a small city.  On top of that you will have the government inspectors, both state and federal that will be constantly over looking every thing that is going on to see that all safety rules and regulations are adheared to. 

So don't go off half cocked and call your congressional members untill you find out more than the hype being put out by the media, Trout Unlimited, The Sierria Club, environmental groups, and this one rich guy.

Read more here:http://www.pebblepartnership.com/project/faqs     

[Sourdough]

Why do so many people in the lower 48 feel like they have a say in what we do in our state.  We do not go to congress to stop a mine in West Virginia, or an oil well in Oklahoma.  We don't feel we have the right to tell you what to do in your state.  So what gives people in the lower 48 the right to call or write Congress, to stop Alaska from doing the same things being done in the lower 48.  You run your state, let us run ours.  Keep out of our business.  In many cases the people in the lower 48 have ruined their environment, and are now living with the consequences.  We in Alaska have seen what has been done in other places and are not about to let it happen here.  We love our Hunting and Fishing, that is why we live here.  We are not about to let anyone take that away from us.

We need jobs in rural Alaska.  Gasoline in the rural areas runs $8.00 to $11.00 a gallon.  Same for heating oil.  Electricity in those areas is produced with oil as well.  With no jobs how can those people heat their homes, or run their boats to fish to feed their families.  Or to buy gas to run their snowmachine to go Caribou hunting during the winter.  The Government came in and built nice new homes for the residents of rural Alaska.  Those homes have oil heat, running water, septic systems, and electricity.  Unlike the old homes they have to be kept heated, or pipes burst.  If the pipes burst the house is uninhabitable till spring thaw.  The elders say they were better off in their dugouts, no pipes to freeze if they went hunting for a week or so.

[Conan The Librarian]

A lot of prople in TU are preservationists who consider it a crime to catch and keep a trout occasionally. They have given me a bad name in my favorite trout fishing area because a bunch of doctors and lawyer TU members are trying to make the area fly fishing only. There are places I need to avoid because they don't like fly fishermen anymore. The people are mad about it because it's their land, and they have easements to allow people to fish. The new slot limits in the area basically close the season on trout because its unlikely to catch any fish bigger than the slot maximun and fish smaller than the slot minimum are not worth keeping. Locals can't even take their kids fishing on their own land.


I used to be a TU member, but its too much like PETA now.

[Sourdough]

EPA finally weighed in, here is their comment.
 
http://www.adn.com/2012/05/18/2470043/epa-large-mine-prospect-could.html#storylink=misearch
 
Remember, if they do this in Alaska, they will be at your doorstep next.