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US Approves Montana Mine After Long Ecology Fight    [

    Federal Energy Leases Could Erode Newly Reinstated "Roadless" Rule
    By Michelle Chen
    The NewStandard

    Tuesday 17 October 2006

    Last month, conservationists celebrated the restoration of federal protections to about 50 million acres of "roadless" public lands. But now, activists in Colorado are warning that an upcoming federal auction for energy-development leases is letting thousands of roadless acres slip through the cracks.

    As part of its quarterly oil and gas leasing auction, the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) plans to offer more than 130,000 federal acres in the state. The leases would generally allow energy companies to extract resources and construct roads and pipelines.

    The auction, set for November 9, would include over 600 acres of national forest land in the Sunnyside Roadless Area in western Colorado. Officially designated as "roadless," the land is shielded from industrial and commercial activities under a landmark federal rule enacted in 2001, which restricts development on roadless areas throughout the country.

    Though BLM's sale notice indicates that leases may be subject to certain environmental regulations, the government has the authority to suspend or limit rules to suit the interests of individual lease-holders.

    Steve Smith, assistant regional director for the Wilderness Society, told The NewStandard that conservationists are wary that opening protected lands to commercial interests through auctions could reduce the enforcement of roadless protections to the government's "judgment call." "If [the regulation] gets waived or it gets altered as development happens," he said, "then that roadlessness has been damaged."

    In a joint statement issued last week, the Colorado Environmental Coalition, Wilderness Society, Forest Guardian, Wilderness Workshop and High Country Citizens Alliance denounced the auction plan as a potential violation of the recently reinstated protections. The groups called for a withdrawal of the proposed roadless leases "until and unless they include prohibitions on new road-building."

    The Bush administration repealed the original "roadless rule" in 2005, basically shifting the responsibility of protecting roadless areas onto individual states. Last month, a California federal district court struck down the White House policy altogether in a legal challenge brought by conservation groups and state governments. Though the decision might still be overturned on appeals brought by the timber industry or other opponents, it effectively reinstated the previous roadless protections.

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    US Approves Montana Mine After Long Ecology Fight
    By Laura Zuckerman
    Reuters

    Monday 16 October 2006

    Salmon, Idaho - The US Fish and Wildlife Service cleared the way for a silver and copper mine in northwest Montana Friday that has been mired in controversy for more than two decades.

    Revett Silver Company of Spokane, Washington, a subsidiary of Revett Minerals, plans to open a 10,000-ton-per-day operation by tapping deposits below the Cabinet Mountain Wilderness in Montana, one of the nation's first areas to receive protections under the landmark 1964 Wilderness Act.

    Clearance by the federal wildlife agency for the planned Rock Creek Mine, which is expected to cost more than $165 million over a five-year, multiphase process, comes after years-long legal battles between the mining company and conservation groups over the region's fragile ecosystem.

    The Cabinets contain a small and struggling population of grizzly bears, which are protected under the federal Endangered Species Act, and a dwindling number of threatened bull trout.

    In a decision released Friday, the Fish and Wildlife Service said the mine will not adversely affect the area's bears and fish provided the company monitors the effects of its operations on both populations over the mine's 35-year life.

    Carson Rife, Revett's vice president of operations, hailed the decision as a major milestone, saying the measures the mining outfit will adopt to lessen the impacts on protected species show that "we can actually have a cooperative situation between industry and the environment."

    Environmentalists vowed to return to court over the decision. Conservation groups say the Rock Creek Mine will deal a death blow to both species by displacing the area's 30 remaining bears and fouling the waterways where bull trout live and spawn.

    "Bull trout there are experiencing a death by a thousand cuts and this is the worst of all," said Rob Roberts, coordinator with Trout Unlimited, the nation's leading trout and salmon conservation organization.

    The Fish and Wildlife Service in 2003 concluded the proposed Rock Creek Mine would not place bears and fish at risk but last year a federal judge ruled that assessment was flawed.

    In issuing its approval to Revett on Friday, the Fish and Wildlife Service said the mitigation steps it is requiring the mining outfit to adopt should satisfy the concerns raised in the 2005 court ruling.