The votes are in. In nearly one week the people of Alaska will hear the results of their attempts to put a stop the proposed pebble mine project. Read more here http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D9Q5LTCO0.htm
If anyone is not yet familiar with the pebble project I would suggest doing a bit of research. This proposed open pit copper and gold mine would be the largest to date and would leave a huge hole in the Bristol Bay watershed. There would be a 4.3 mile long reservoir filled with chemical waste that would forever rest near the headwaters of one the last salmon strongholds in the world! There would also be development through much of the most beautiful country in U.S. and Canada to accommodate the many semi loads of equipment that would be traveling to the site. Along with new highways there would be many bridges, pipelines, and power lines that would cost billions and take many years to develop. If you would like to see less salmon and fresh water and more, power lines, highways, pipelines, dams and toxic reservoirs vote for the pebble mine. Or if you’re smart you can fight to save our fresh water and an ecosystem that depends on it. Fresh water is worth more than all the copper and gold in the world. Unless of course we learn to live off drinking chemical waste, which there will be plenty of if the mine is developed. One more thing I’d like to note is that the companies promoting the Pebble Project are FOREIGN companies. The U.S. would see improvements on the cost of the resources extracted from the mine but in the end we lose our natural resources while other countries get rich. Visit http://www.savebristolbay.org/ to find ways you can help.