News

Duluth News Tribune
December 20, 2009

A team of Iron Rangers has been working for years to bring "the next generation of mining" to Northeastern Minnesota. Under the name PolyMet, the team acquired a massive, long-idled processing plant. It lined up investors from around the world, spent more than $20 million of the investors' money in preparations, and is now, it says, "in the late stages of the environmental review process."

A long-awaited draft environmental impact statement, more than four years in the making, was unveiled in October, a major step in making PolyMet a long-needed reality. The statement explains how the mine can process copper, nickel, platinum and other valuable metals in accordance with strong state and federal environmental rules and regulations.

Public comments on the draft statement are being accepted even as Minnesota's U.S. senators and the region's representative in Congress and others in high places voice their strong support for PolyMet and copper mining.

The plan will be tweaked before final approval. The company then must apply for permits before this boon for our region can begin operations.

Iron ore has been mined from our region since the 19th century. PolyMet would be a different kind of mining. Copper, nickel, cobalt, palladium, platinum and gold are precious metals used to make everything from electronics to jewelry. Rich deposits have been found just south of the famed Mesabi Iron Range.

How rich? We're actually sitting on the third-largest nickel deposit in the world, with the potential to create thousands of construction jobs and hundreds of good-paying permanent positions. The industry could mean an economic impact in the hundreds of millions of dollars for

And not all of it from PolyMet. At least four more companies are poised to follow PolyMet's permitting and environmental-review lead.

At least 37 pages of laws and regulations are in place to monitor and to take care of environmental issues, including after mines close. The existing provisions even prevent the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources from issuing mining permits if precautions aren't taken.

"No additional restrictions are necessary," Frank Ongaro, executive director of Mining Minnesota, a coalition of copper-mining ventures, told the News Tribune earlier this year.

Two groups strongly opposed to copper mining are far removed from the Northland. The Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness group is based nowhere near the Boundary Waters, but in Minneapolis. And the Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy is based in St. Paul.

Much of their concern has centered on sulfuric acid, which has run off at other copper mining operations, including ones in countries devoid of or nearly devoid of environmental laws and concerns. At those mines where acid runoff has been a problem, the sulfur content of the rock has been as high as 15 percent to 30 percent. The sulfur content of the rock at the PolyMet site is 1 percent or lower. It's negligible.

"There's no one more interested in doing this right than those of us who live here. This is our backyard," PolyMet President and Chief Execu tive Officer Joseph Scipioni told members of the News Tribune editorial page during a visit this year to PolyMet. "This is not worth doing if we can't do it right. That's what the [environmental-review] process is all about."

An impressive and reassuring list of agencies and others are making sure PolyMet -- and any companies that follow -- will "do it right." The list includes the DNR, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Environmental Protection Agency and three tribal governments.

The timing is right for copper mining. New technology allows precious metals to be recovered without smelters, the biggest culprit in the industry's dirty-air history.

In addition, PolyMet would bring back to life the former LTV taconite plant near Hoyt Lakes. The massive facility was one of the largest construction projects ever undertaken in the U.S. when it was built in the mid-1950s for $350 million. That's $2.7 billion in today's dollars. Closed in 2001, the facility's water tower, power plant, tailings ponds, grinders, crushers and other features and infrastructure all can be reused. And it would be a shame not to with opportunity presenting itself.

"This is an exciting project that's ready to add to the viability of this region" Ongaro said.

Added U.S. Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., in a letter of support to the DNR: "PolyMet will help diversify the economy of the iron ore- dependent Range, and will help meet our nation's domestic demand for copper, nickel, platinum, cobalt, gold and palladium. Most importantly, this project offers a real opportunity to put Northeastern Minnesota citizens back to work.''

The economy continues to struggle. Despite the protests of a few, many others -- including politicians, bureaucrats, regulators and everyday citizens eager for jobs and prosperity -- are embracing and encouraging PolyMet and copper mining. They can all -- from the Iron Range, from across Minnesota, and all the way to Washington, D.C. -- continue to embrace and encourage a new industry being done right.