Defending Watersheds in Southeast Alaska and British Columbia from Impacts of Mining

These watersheds are rich with wildlife, and their salmon harvests sustain local fishing enterprises and Alaska Native and First Nations communities. The mines involve large-scale infrastructure development and generate immense quantities of tailings and mine wastes. Water treatment will be required in perpetuity. The threat of catastrophic dam failures will hang over the watersheds for centuries after the closure of the mines.

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Case Overview

The Taku, Stikine, and Unuk rivers flow across the Canada-United States border, from headwaters in the Coast Mountains of British Columbia through Southeast Alaska to the sea. These watersheds are rich with wildlife, and their salmon harvests sustain local fishing enterprises and Alaska Native and First Nations communities.

Native peoples have harvested salmon and caribou from these watersheds for generations, and continue to rely on such harvests today. Commercial fishermen from Southeast Alaska also rely on these harvests, harvesting tens of millions of dollars worth of salmon from these three rivers annually. The watersheds collectively support hundreds of Alaskan workers and their families.

The watersheds are now endangered by the development of metals mines in British Columbia. They involve large-scale infrastructure development and generate immense quantities of tailings and mine wastes. Water treatment will be required in perpetuity. The threats of acid-mine drainage and heavy metals pollution—not to mention catastrophic dam failures—will hang over the watersheds for centuries after the closure of the mines.

A coalition of conservation and Alaska Native groups have formally invoked Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell’s duties under a federal law to investigate six hard-rock mines in British Columbia, and their expected impacts on transboundary watersheds shared by the United States and Canada. The six mines are the Tulsequah Chief, Red Chris, Schaft Creek, Galore Creek, Kerr-Sulphurets-Mitchell, and Brucejack mines.

The petition, submitted under the 1971 Pelly Amendment to the Fishermen’s Protective Act by Earthjustice’s Alaska regional office, analyzes the mine projects and their expected impacts on watersheds, and invokes the Interior Department’s duty to investigate when foreign nationals may be “diminishing the effectiveness” of U.S. conservation treaties.

The petition was made by the Craig Tribal Association, Friends of the Stikine Society, Inside Passage Waterkeeper, Organized Village of Kasaan, Rivers Without Borders, Petersburg Indian Association, Salmon State, Sierra Club of British Columbia, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, Trout Unlimited, United Tribal Transboundary Mining Work Group, and Earthjustice.

Video:

The film Xboundary, by Ryan Peterson, explores the large-scale open-pit mining boom currently underway in northwest British Columbia, Canada. Concerns over risks posed by the mines were heightened with the August 4, 2014, catastrophic tailings dam failure at Mt. Polley Mine in the Fraser River watershed.

Additional video, Water is Life: “To try to put a measure on why clean water is so important is hard to do, except that it is what this community is,” says Petersburg resident Karin McCullough in Water is Life, a film by Inside Passage Waterkeeper on the heritage, livelihoods, and futures that rely on a healthy Stikine River.

Photo Spotlight on The Red Chris Mine:

A copper-gold mine on the Stikine river watershed, the Red Chris Mine is one of the six subjects of the groups’ petition. The project includes an open pit mine, ore mill, tailings impoundment, waste rock dump, power lines, water works, mine camp, and a possible explosives manufacturing facility. The mine began operations on February 15, 2015.

View of the Tulsequah River, looking east towards the confluence with Taku River.
View of the Tulsequah River, looking east towards the confluence with Taku River. (Photo courtesy of Chris Miller / Trout Unlimited)

Case Updates

July 14, 2020 Document

SEITC B.C. Mines OAS Petition

Petition (updated in July 2020) to the Inter-American Commission On Human Rights seeking relief from violations of the rights of the members of the Southeast Alaska Indigenous Transboundary Commission resulting from hard-rock mining in British Columbia, Canada

The Stikine River runs through Wrangell, Alaska. Mining operations nearby threaten to poison fish in the Stikine watershed and destroy the traditions and livelihoods of Southeast Alaskan Tribes.
December 7, 2018 Article

Canada As Ugly Neighbor: Mines in B.C. Would Devastate Alaskan Tribes

Southeast Alaskan Tribes have brought a human rights petition against Canada to protect the fish at the center of their cultures.

Stikine River
December 5, 2018 Press Release

British Columbia Mining Linked with Human Rights Violations for Alaska Tribal Nations

Southeast Alaska Indigenous Transboundary Commission submits human rights petition to Inter-American Commission