It’s hardly a surprise to find out that this administration’s EPA thinks it’s omniscient. Like leader, like follower. This time, the EPA thinks it can determine the environmental damage of a project before the project applies for permits:
Researchers hired by Pebble have donned dry suits to snorkel through the arctic streams to study spawning habitat and count fish, adding some 7,000 pages of investigative work to another 20,000 pages of environmental reviews the mine company has so far produced.
“It’s one of the most comprehensive environmental studies of a mine project in Alaska, and probably nationwide,” said Mike Heatwole, vice president of public affairs for Pebble.
The problem is that the studies have not been completed or analyzed, and the actual mine plan has not been finalized.
But that hasn’t stopped the EPA from jumping the gun to write its own assessment of the mining operation’s effects on the surrounding 20,000 square mile area and on the salmon population and other species in Bristol Bay—120 miles away from the proposed mining operation site.
The best that the EPA can do with that limited amount of information is guess what the environmental impact might be under specific scenarios. At best, their opinions are wild-ass guesses. At worst, they’re opinions written by the militant environmentalist organizations that contribute to President Obama:
Pebble officials say the EPA’s preemptive actions set a dangerous precedent.
“What’s really a concern to us is that the EPA has never stepped into this kind of preemptive space…before we’ve even defined development scenarios for the mine,” Heatwole said. “The EPA is being asked by environmentalists and a number of native Alaskan tribes to potentially take action against us before we have even defined our project and submitted an application.”
The thought that the EPA is basing their decisions on politics, not science, isn’t surprising. Environmentalist organizations have contributed tons of money to President Obama this cycle. Most of these militant environmentalist organizations don’t care about the science as much as they care about their agenda.
It would be reckless to say that these organizations don’t care about the environment. It’s just that there’ve been too many instances where these organizations put a higher priority on their agenda of controlling lives than they put on protecting the environment.
The thought of the EPA making pre-emptive rulings should frighten everyone. The EPA has enough trouble getting their rulings right when they have all the facts. The EPA making rulings before they have the facts if downright frightening.
Tags: EPA, Mining, Copper, Gold, Molybdenum, Alaska, Environementalists, Campaign Contributions, Elections
The EPA has already made big trouble for one mining operation in Alaska that I know of. They and their environmental wacko buddies continually complain about the amount of heavy metals being “moved” outside the boundaries of the mine site. It’s a LEAD MINE! The streams are actually cleaner there now than before, because much of the surface lead had been removed! Think logic matters?