April 28, 2023 — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will review its 2020 permit denial of the Pebble Mine plan, potentially giving the project a longshot chance at survival.
After an appeal by the Pebble Limited Partnership, the agency’s reviewing officers issued an 81-page report April 24 that faulted some aspects of the permit decision by the Corps’ Alaska District. The administrative finding means the issue will be remanded back to the district for further consideration.
The Corps in 2020 rejected the Pebble partners’ application for permits to build an open-pit gold and copper mine upstream from tributaries to Bristol Bay, famed as the world’s most productive wild salmon fishery grounds, where activists for a decade had opposed mining.
The fortunes of Pebble backers have swung back and forth through three presidential administrations. In January 2023 the U.S. Environmental Protection Administration found the mine proposal to be incompatible with the federal Clean Water Act, precluding mineral development that would affect those salmon streams.
The Pebble Limited Partnership continues its legal appeals, but faces other barriers alongside the EPA decision. In December the Pedro Bay Corporation and Bristol Bay Heritage Land Trust finalized land conservation easements that would effectively block the Pebble developers’ preferred road route to the mining site.
Read the full story at National Fisherman