Aftermath of the Brumadinho dam collapse in Brazil. Photo by TV NBR (CC BY 3.0)
Michigan and Wisconsin could face devastating environmental damage if an open-pit mine near Lake Michigan releases toxic waste into the two states’ waterways, Al Gedicks reports in Urban Milwaukee.
The planned “Back Forty” metallic sulfide mine, owned by Aquila Resources, a Canadian exploration company, would cover 123 acres next to the Menominee River on the Michigan-Wisconsin border.
The Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin and local residents on both sides of the Menominee River spoke out against the project at a public hearing in June.
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources is not involved in the approval process, since the mine would be sited in Michigan, and state authorities there are responsible for its approval.
Despite evidence of the danger that a dam designed to contain tailings—waste left over after the minerals have been extracted from ore—could spill toxic waste into Lake Michigan, regulators in Michigan approved the mining company’s application for a wetlands permit.
The tailings dam’s design is associated with the January 2019 Brazilian tailings dam disaster that killed at least 250 people in Brazil’s deadliest-ever mining accident,” Gedicks reports, and there have been 46 tailings dam failures in the last 20 years.
Nevertheless, “the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy (EGLE) appears ready to approve the dam’s design,” according to Gedicks.
The mine was welcomed by Michigan’s former Republican governor Rick Snyder. In 2018 Michigan elected Democratic governor Gretchen Whitmer.
Read more at Urban Milwaukee
Our stories may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. We ask that you edit only for style or to shorten, provide proper attribution and link to our web site. Please see our republishing guidelines for use of photos and graphics.
Related News
