The Pebble people are pulling out all the stops. With the Trump and Dunleavy Administrations in power, Pebble knows now is the time to ram through a giant open-pit mine in the headwaters of the richest sockeye salmon fishery in the world. But Pebble knows a strong majority of Alaskans oppose the mine. They also know the facts and science...
We’ve reviewed dozens of Environmental Impact Statements over the years. And while they’re not our preferred bedtime reading, we were looking forward to seeing what the federal Army Corps had to say in the recently released Draft EIS (DEIS) for the proposed Pebble Mine. Our conclusion: the Pebble EIS is a bad joke. It’s incomplete. It’s...
With the recent release of the draft Environmental Impact Statement for the Pebble mine in record-fast time, Alaskans have been dismayed at the slapdash efforts of our federal and state governments to ram through a thin and incomplete review for a giant gold mine in the headwaters of Bristol Bay. And one of the gravest oversights in the...
The proposed Pebble mine in southwest Alaska stands out for a variety reasons, including the fact it would be the first large-scale, open pit mine in the headwaters of the Bristol Bay - the richest sockeye salmon fishery in the world. But with the recent release of the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the project, Pebble gains...
Act NOW to Protect Salmon Habitat – Comments Due March 22 BACKGROUND: The proposed Donlin mine along the banks of the Kuskokwim River in southwest Alaska would be a massive open gold mine. To power the facility, Donlin plans a 315 mile-long natural gas pipeline from Cook Inlet through the Skwentna, Yentna and Kuskokwim...
BACKGROUND: In January 2019, Governor Dunleavy lopped-off $20 million in education funding in the state’s supplemental budget – an amount approved through bipartisan negotiations in the Alaska House and Senate last year, and money school districts relied on in their budgets through the remainder of the fiscal year. But the real...
Few people noticed a recent op-ed by a guy named Rick Whitbeck, who holds himself out as the Alaska Director for a group he calls Power the Future. The piece was unremarkable for the most part, but it caught my eye for its unhinged and juvenile attacks on anyone who cares about clean water, healthy salmon and wild Alaska. Then I started to...
Alaska is the most profitable oil and gas province in the world. Yet under current forecasts, Alaska is staring down the barrel of a $1.6 billion deficit for the coming fiscal year. Governor Dunleavy came into office promising to cut expenses to balance our budget. But even if he fired every state employee, he’d still wouldn’t be...
Oil and gas corporations are engaged in a radical program to transfer Alaska’s public wealth into private coffers. For example, the oil corporations in Alaska spent $14 million in 2014 to fight back citizen-led efforts to repeal Senate Bill 21, the oil tax legislation introduced by former ConocoPhillips lobbyist Sean Parnell, and passed...
I attended a presentation this week in Homer by Mark Hamilton, Vice President of External Affairs and mouthpiece for the Pebble mine, and it was remarkable on a couple fronts. First, the tone. Hamilton spoke down to the crowd like a seasoned used car salesman, highlighting only the possible benefits of the Pebble Mine, and flatly ignoring...
