Plan for mine near Mount St. Helens advances
LONGVIEW, Wash. (AP) - The Forest Service says a mining company can prospect for gold, copper and other minerals near Mount St. Helens.
The agency said Tuesday that drilling planned by Ascot Resources 12 miles north of the volcano would not have a major impact on the environment of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest.
The Daily News reports the drilling still needs approval from the Bureau of Land Management, which could weigh in later this week.
Once it has a permit, Ascot could begin drilling at 23 sites as soon as next summer. This allows exploration, but there's no approval yet to develop a mine.
The agency said Tuesday that drilling planned by Ascot Resources 12 miles north of the volcano would not have a major impact on the environment of the Gifford Pinchot National Forest.
The Daily News reports the drilling still needs approval from the Bureau of Land Management, which could weigh in later this week.
Once it has a permit, Ascot could begin drilling at 23 sites as soon as next summer. This allows exploration, but there's no approval yet to develop a mine.
View from the left: Oil is dirty, so we don't want drilling! We want our electric cars, even though they use a lot more lead and copper than a gas-powered car! But we don't want to mine the needed copper and lead locally, providing jobs to local workers, because the environmental risks are to high! But we don't want corporations to remain in business by outsourcing mining jobs to China, because they have lax environmental laws!
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*face-palm* Choose your trade-offs and stick with it, folks.
This allows time to grease all the necessary palms.
In 1892 The St. Helens Mining district was organized.... by 1905 a total of 13 tons of copper valued at $286.00 was mined. That copper is now the statue of Sacajawea erected at the 1905 world's fair known as the Lewis and Clark Exposition in Portland, Oregon. (Source of information: "Mt. St. Helens and The Toutle Valley -The Early Years" by Dale Hoy - 'nuf said.
@tourguide Thank you for not saying "just sayin"
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I'd be surprised if they allow this as it goes against their new Agenda 21 Plan.
Until the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management clean up the 8.5 million tons of mine tailings in Holden at the head of Lake Chelan, they should not be allowed to open any new mining. The current effort is a very expensive band aide and at taxpayer expense. The Howe Sound Mining Company pays nothing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holden_Village,_Washington
@al_wa Good post, and i agree
Take a look at what happened in the Okanogan highlands with the gold mine there. Pollution of waters, failure of retention ponds and poisons from the process in spite of efforts by community groups to show that it was risky. Besides the federal law allowing prospecting and mining is so old that it amounts to a rip-off of the owners of the lands, the citizens of this country.