MCEA Fall Duluth Update

Hello, friends in the northland! We’re thrilled to launch this new update from the MCEA Duluth office with content specifically tailored for our local audience. We hope this quarterly newsletter provides some additional insights into what we’re up to, how MCEA is thinking about the environmental issues that impact northeastern Minnesota, and how you can get more involved. Thank you for reading.

DNR To Address Dam Safety at MilePost 7 (Silver Bay)

This summer, the Minnesota DNR announced that it will issue an important decision about the MilePost 7 mine tailings facility near Silver Bay in September. MCEA has been directly involved in this issue for years (really, all the way back to the 70’s). Recently, the facility’s owner, Northshore Mining, has proposed expanding the tailings basin to contain more tailings, and our team at MCEA has been raising some questions about the process. The facility at MilePost 7 has been holding a significant amount of taconite pollution since its creation in the 1970’s, and the existing environmental review for it is extremely old – more than 40 years.

Because of this, we petitioned DNR for environmental review – signed by many of you – and later submitted a comment and letter to the agency about the need for updated review that also addresses dam safety at the site. 

As a result of the “large number of public comments” submitted to the agency, DNR moved its decision to September 1. We expect to learn more in September and hope that DNR orders review that includes the issue of dam safety at the site. You can read MCEA’s comment and letter. Jay Boller covered the issue for RacketMN in February.

Lutsen and Forest Service hit pause on proposed expansion

When Lutsen Mountain proposed to expand its ski hill into 500 acres of Superior National Forest land and 1854 Treaty area, our team at MCEA took note. In December of 2021, we commented that the U.S. Forest Service must not grant the permit unless it fixes key flaws in the process. With the support of valued local partners, we emphasized that the process must recognize and uphold treaty rights, account for impacts to water quality, include measures to reduce those impacts, and consider that clear-cutting 140-year-old old growth forest could be an irreversible result of the development. As parties to the 1854 Treaty and sovereign nations, the Grand Portage, Fond du Lac, and Bois Forte Chippewa Bands have special status in this process. 

Lutsen has now asked the Forest Service to hold off on deciding whether or not to grant the special use permit for their proposal, describing an “overdue shift” at the Forest Service in honoring tribal rights in our region. The recently announced pause comes in the context of an important Memorandum of Understanding between the three Chippewa Bands and the U.S. Forest Service signed this past May, which provides for co-stewardship of treaty resources across the Superior National Forest. 

We commend all parties to the discussion for this positive development and the Bands for their leadership. You can track these recent happenings in more detail via WTIP’s excellent coverage of the MOU and Lutsen’s deferral request. 

More Mining for … Climate? Help MCEA Respond to the Industry’s Favorite New Talking Point

Perhaps you’ve observed the steady stream of talking points from the mining industry trumpeting the need for metals like copper, nickel, and lithium in the fight to address the climate crisis. What mining companies really mean of course is that we need them, even though the industry itself is a major contributor to greenhouse gas pollution. 

Unfortunately, the simple version of this narrative can be seductive for the media and elected officials: “There is copper and nickel in current clean energy tech; therefore, we need more new copper and nickel.” The Star Tribune, for example, recently published a widely read article entitled Minnesota locked in global dilemma: More copper and nickel are needed, but mine development slow, adopting much of the industry framework. Similar examples abound.

Of course, the reality is not so simple. Here are a few things the mining industry's PR omits:

• There are better ways to get more metals. Current recycling rates are low, despite recycling being far less polluting and energy intensive than new mining.
• Innovation and materials substitution also promise significant benefits from an environmental perspective. Technology is constantly evolving away from costly and problematic materials. Manufacturers are already shifting to new products that reduce the need for metals.
• We can electrify in a way that reduces metal demand and improves peoples’ lives. Think: free, electric public transit for all and fewer prohibitively expensive 6,000-lb electric trucks to get one person around town.
• If copper and nickel supply is ever really in an emergency state, materials could be diverted towards clean energy and away from less essential uses. Relatively little copper and nickel actually go to clean energy technologies at the moment. 
• And, of course, new mining means polluting water. 

If we are going to adequately protect air, land, and water resources in Minnesota from the international sulfide mining industry, we need to ask better questions than simply: Do we need copper or nickel? Let’s also ask: How should the value of water, health, community wellbeing, and carbon-sequestering land play into the analysis of “need” for energy-relevant metals? What are the best ways to get the metals? Are our standards up to snuff for producing it here? 

New mining must be a last resort, subject to the highest possible standards – not as an "easy" answer to a complex problem. We've put together some helpful materials at MCEA on our Mining the Climate Crisis webpage and invite you to share. Chris Ingraham's recent piece in the Minnesota Reformer, Copper Demand Softens, is also helpful. 

Thank you, Jackson!

A special thanks to Jackson Faris for interning with us in Duluth this summer. Jackson is a recent graduate of the College of Saint Scholastica who traveled with MCEA to Honduras last March (stay tuned for more on that soon). He’s spent time with us this summer helping with writing projects and events. Thank you, Jackson!