In the remote reaches of northern British Columbia are North America’s most important salmon rivers: The Stikine and Skeena, Nass, Iskut and Unuk. Together, with their main tributaries, they create a wild trans-boundary corridor that reaches from the alpine valleys of the Sacred Headwaters to the coastal temperate rainforests of Alaska, where eagles still gather by the hundreds to feast on salmon runs so rich they color the sea. It is one of the few places on all the earth where such natural abundance can still be found, where herds of caribou mark the horizons and grizzly bear and wolves are commonly encountered. Three times the size of Switzerland, this wild river region remains intact but its fate hangs in the balance.
With permits in hand and subsidized power about to be delivered, Imperial Metals needs only to raise investment capital to begin the dismantling of Todagin Mountain, home to the largest population of stone sheep in the world. Farther west, high in the Coast Mountains, Seabridge Gold is on the brink of securing approval for Kerr Sulphurets Mitchell, a massive open pit gold mine in the Unuk river headwaters that will bring the destruction of three mountains, two dams the size of Hoover to hold back acid mine waste, and two tunnels 14 miles in length to carry ore to the Nass watershed. These mines are only two of the more than thirty proposed.
Rivers aren’t safe either: hundreds of dams are planned across British Columbia. One of the largest, Forest Kerr Hydroelectric project, calls for a 195-mw run of river dam that would divert the salmon-bearing Iskut River through a tunnel thirty-feet in diameter and nearly two miles in length. With the dam, roads and transmission lines will run through heavily forested and pristine river valleys, imposing for the first time industrial infrastructure in the wild border region of Alaska and British Columbia.
The most ominous project is a proposal by Royal Dutch Shell to extract coal bed methane gas from the Sacred Headwaters across an area of close to a million acres. Shell Canada’s eight year tenure in the Klappan is due to expire in 2012, as is the provincial government’s moratorium on coal bed methane development. Should this project go ahead, it would imply a network of 6000 wells, linked by roads and pipelines, laid on the landscape.
Separately these projects are daunting but not overwhelming; together they spell the end of an entire region and the end of salmon in British Columbia.
Please consider the value of the resources before mining and the long-term effects on the environment. Please do not mine.
Please do not mine.
If you cannot leave the area better than you found it, do not mine there.
That’s a challenge dudes. Let’s see you lead the way as world citizens.
The thought of Imperial Metals destroying the habitat of the stone sheep really makes me hope the president of that company catches the horns and hard head of a stone sheep straight up his backside. It makes no sense to me that there are no strict regulations to limit the destruction of the environment, and the animals that live in these pristine areas. I am an animal lover and a bit of a tree hugger so this really pisses me off.
Whit the decline in the value of the dollar and the sky rocketing price of gold it seems unlikely that anyone will be able to put a stop to this. As much as i disagree with most of what PETA does, it might be worth the exposure they can bring to let them know about this. I think that might be my next mission.
Thanks for bringing this to our attention.
If it wasn’t for National Geographic, and the show on the Redwoods you did I would never have found your site. Thanks for all you do for our planet.
More people need to become aware of this attack on our planet. I will do what I can and help those at the forefront. Feel free to contact me.
WARNING, warning! A disaster is looming! I spent quite a bit time in the Sacred Headwaters last october and yes, this is the last refuge, this is a place of worldwide interest and we have to do whatever we can to protect it from all kinds of attacks. Volunteers can contact me to take action.
Please don’t mine. We do not want our lands raped, our forests cut down and our wild life wrought with plague. Do not poison that which we all eat and drink from.
Canada is still a mostly pristine beautiful country will an extraordinary abundance of natural resources. People from all over the world wish to visit and revel in its beauty and bounty. We also aspire to being able to afford to eat true unspoilt natural salmon as is found only in very few places in the world. We all know that gold prices will rise as the value attributable to our paper money continually decreases, yet I just cannot see the intrinsic value of a metal, however beautiful! In future years I would much rather have clean water to drink, (another increasingly scare resource) and one of the most healthy fish varieties known. I, personally, can do quite well without another new car every two-five years, thank you, even though some can’t, but neither of us can do without clean water and food.
Please do not mine.
I’m for clean Salmon and clean water. No to Open Pit Mines.
Open pit mines create irreparable scars on the landscape and cause lasting damage to ecosystems. Please do not grant Seabridge Gold a permit to mine.
Thanks for your consideration.
Michael Gill
Anadromous species are facing enough threats without destruction and degredation of their natal rivers. Putting a mine in place is the same as signing a death warrent for these runs. Do not mine!