A major copper and gold mining project in the rugged mountains of northwest British Columbia – upriver from a fishing town in southeast Alaska – is set to receive a helping hand from the Canadian government.

Canada’s Department of Natural Resources announced last month that it plans to pump about US$15 million into a massive copper and gold development project just 25 miles from the Alaska border. The project is perched above the tributaries of the Stikine River, a major salmon waterway that flows into Alaska’s Inside Passage, between the small towns of Wrangell and Petersburg.

Public funds would be used to build a key 27-mile stretch of road in Galore Creek, which is equally owned by two major mining companies, Teck and Newmont. The project is located on the traditional territory of the Tahltan First Nation.

Galore Creek spans more than 600 square miles of mining claims, including areas located directly along the glacier-fed Stikine.

The new government-funded road, providing access to a proposed processing site, “will help unlock the project and the region’s substantial critical mineral potential,” Bernard Wessels, a Newmont executive, said in a prepared statement this month. last.

Canada’s efforts to help Teck and Newmont discover some 12 billion pounds of copper and 9 million ounces of gold at Galore Creek are part of a broader effort by the country’s federal government and Colombia’s provincial government -British to promote mining in the isolated and largely roadless mountains near the Alaska border.

Over the past three months, Canada and British Columbia have announced they will spend approximately $185 million on mining infrastructure in the region. Much of that money comes from a billion-dollar national fund intended to boost production of minerals that Canadian officials say are essential for energy and national security.

The investments added to long-standing concerns of Alaska Native leaders and conservationists who live and fish downstream of Galore Creek and other projects under development.

“Rather than honoring Indigenous sovereignty and its treaty obligations, Canada is making our traditional lands and waters the sacrifice zone for the benefit of British Columbia’s mining industry and its shareholders,” Richard Chalyee Éesh Peterson, chairman of Southeast Alaska’s largest tribal government, the Central Council of the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, said in a statement to the Northern Journal.

Several rivers in the region cross the U.S.-Canada border, and tribal governments and environmental groups in coastal Alaska worry that new mines in northwest British Columbia could pollute these rivers and harm lucrative and culturally vital fisheries. Concerns grew over the summer after a cyanide spill at a major Canadian gold mine located in the Yukon River watershed, Alaska’s largest transboundary waterway.

Following this spill, Alaska’s congressional delegation sent a letter to the Biden administration urging the president to support “binding and enforceable international protections and financial guarantees for any potential impacts to transboundary watersheds.” , including the Stikine.

But the letter doesn’t go so far as to call for some of the measures requested by Southeast Alaska tribes and advocates.

These include a permanent ban on dams impounding mining waste above transboundary salmon rivers. They also include a temporary pause in mineral exploration, development and permitting on the Canadian side of these watersheds until Canada and the United States reach agreement on protections developed with governments indigenous. .

The tribally-led Southeast Alaska Native Transboundary Commission says Canada and British Columbia’s regulatory systems don’t adequately protect transboundary rivers and traditional lands — and those governments don’t failed to obtain consent from Alaska tribes.

“It’s not something they’re building in some faraway area. It’s literally in our backyard,” Esther Aaltséen Reese said of Galore Creek. Reese is the commission chairman and administrator of the Wrangell tribal government, the Wrangell Cooperative Association.

In addition to the Galore Creek Highway, Canada’s federal government intends to spend money on highway upgrades and a study of power lines connecting northern British Columbia and the Yukon Territory. This infrastructure is intended to support copper, molybdenum, nickel, cobalt, tungsten and zinc mining projects, according to Natural Resources Canada.

In particular, according to a spokesperson for the federal agency, road improvements could help seven mining projects in British Columbia. These include Galore Creek; another large copper and gold project near the Stikine River called Schaft Creek; and KSM, a massive proposed gold and copper mine in the cross-border Unuk River watershed, south of the Stikine.

The power line project, meanwhile, could support eight mining projects in various stages of development in the Yukon Territory, including a few in the transboundary Yukon River watershed. It could also benefit two other mining developments in northern British Columbia, according to the agency.

Natural Resources Canada says the highway project would also enhance public safety by widening shoulders, creating new stops and expanding Wi-Fi access on three roads in northwest British Columbia.

A transmission line runs along Highway 37 in northwestern British Columbia. To stimulate the mining industry, the federal government of Canada and the provincial government of British Columbia are funding the upgrade of the highway and evaluating the advisability of extending the power line. (Max Graham/Journal du Nord)

These improvements were approved by representatives of several First Nations in the region, including the Tahltan, whose traditional lands cover much of northwestern British Columbia.

But the Tahltan Nation also wants to “control the pace and extent of development on our land,” said Beverly Slater, president of the Tahltan Central Government.

The mining industry has provided jobs for many Tahltan citizens, Slater said in a telephone interview, while emphasizing the need to protect water and animals like moose, elk and salmon.

“We are not unlike other countries who must respond to the encroachment of the mining industry and the demand for essential minerals,” Slater said. “Yet we try to protect future generations as much as possible.”

The Tahltan government is currently negotiating with the Government of British Columbia to establish a joint framework for reviewing proposed changes to the Galore Creek Project. This would be the third in a series of joint decision-making agreements between provincial and First Nations governments on mining projects in Tahltan territory.

In 2006, Tahltan executives signed a deal with NovaGold, a company with offices in Salt Lake City and Vancouver that at the time owned half of Galore Creek.

The agreement, which the project’s owners say is still in effect, guaranteed minimum annual payments of $1 million to a Tahltan trust fund, or up to 1 percent royalties on revenues from mineral sales once the mine is operational. It also calls for cooperation between the First Nation and the company during the environmental review and permitting process.

Galore Creek received key environmental approval in 2007, paving the way for the construction of an open pit mine. But development stopped at the end of the same year, due to higher than expected costs.

At the time, Teck and NovaGold projected that the mine could cost $5 billion to build.

NovaGold, which also owns half of the Donlin Gold project in southwest Alaska, agreed in 2018 to sell its stake in Galore Creek to US company Newmont for up to $275 million.

Teck, which owns the other half of Galore Creek, is headquartered in Canada but also operates the massive Red Dog Mine in northwest Alaska, in partnership with Alaska Native Corporation NANA.

Galore Creek Mining Corp. — the joint venture between Teck and Newmont — is currently working on a new study of the project’s potential. It is expected to be completed next year, according to the company’s website.

The company also announced plans, by the end of this year, to seek regulatory approval for a number of changes to the original project, including an increase in production and a new location for waste storage. .

A spokesperson for Galore Creek did not respond to requests for comment.

A spokesperson for B.C.’s Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy declined to comment, citing a policy adopted in the run-up to the Oct. 19 provincial election.

This agency oversees environmental assessments of major mining projects in the province.

“I can see where Canada has a lot to gain,” said Brenda Schwartz-Yeager, a longtime Wrangell resident who runs riverboat tours on the Stikine River. “But we have everything to lose here.”

The Stikine is “one of the last great, truly wild rivers on the planet,” she added. “So it’s a bit of a conundrum, isn’t it? »

Max Graham, Northern Journal contributor can be reached at [email protected]. He is interested in all stories related to mining, as well as introductory meetings with people in and around the industry.