I, me, mine
Lithium mine as a target
It was just a matter of time before environmentalists started protesting projects designed to protect the environment. What an American characteristic!
About 45 miles from the Fort McDermitt Indian Reservation in Nevada, a $2.2 billion project to create the largest lithium mine in the country is being criticized by those who call themselves environmentalists.
Lithium is the most critical component in batteries that power electric vehicles and store energy produced by wind farms and solar arrays. Mankind is going to need it to switch away from fossil fuels and cut down on greenhouse gases.
The mine is being fought using the rationale that it “could” contaminate soil and groundwater. As always, threats of “irreparable damage” are prevalent as well.
The public opposition this time doesn’t come from the rich limousine liberals of Hollywood and the Northeast, but the far less affluent.
Mining is subjected to stiff regulation designed for the express purpose of mitigating negative environmental, health and safety impacts. For the Biden administration’s part, it rightly contends that the “project will help mitigate climate change by speeding the shift away from fossil fuels.”
But Daranda Hinkey of the Fort McDermitt Paiute and Shoshone Tribe and a leader of a group known as People of Red Mountain says it’s not worth it. The Associated Press quotes her: “Lithium mines and this whole push for renewable energy— the agenda of the Green New Deal—is what I like to call green colonialism. It’s going to directly affect my people, my culture, my religion, my tradition.”
The People of Red Mountain say the Thacker Pass lithium mine would desecrate a site where their people were massacred by United States cavalry during the so-called Indian Wars. Besides disturbing a sage grouse nesting area, opponents say the project requires a lot of water, and groundwater and soil could become contaminated with heavy metals.
Could become.
But we imagine that the government, with the Biden administration in charge, already has all kinds of guidelines to keep that from happening. And if it did happen, we imagine
the federal government has all kinds of rules to require cleanup, like it does for everything of this sort.
Not everyone in the tribe agrees with the opposition, and those supporters point to job creation. Lithium Americas, the Canadian company that owns the mine, has promised local hiring, job training and other benefits sorely missing on reservations across the country.
According to the Brookings Institution, the average unemployment rate for Native Americans in 2022 stood at 11.1 percent, almost quadruple the 3 percent unemployment the rest of the nation enjoys today. During the covid pandemic, the average unemployment rate on reservations spiked to nearly 29 percent. Those are Great Depression numbers. And that kind of unemployment has lingering effects.
Life on a reservation can mean a life of poverty. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, about 36 percent of families with children on reservations live below the poverty line compared to just less than 10 percent nationally.
As recently as 2004, according to the nonprofit Partnership with Native Americans, “30 percent of on-reservation housing is overcrowded, and less than 50 percent of it is connected to a public sewer.” We’d hope that in nearly 20 years, those numbers would be better. But 50 percent without public sewer as recently as 2004? That’s awful.
Even with the economic benefits that would come with such a mine, the longer term benefits are environmental. If this country set aside land for every place where the U.S. cavalry once did harm to Native Americans, the place would be a giant untouchable memorial marker.
And since the proposed mine covers about nine square miles, the sage grouse that nest there will have to strut their stuff a few miles down the road. As for the potential for water contamination, that’s part of the NIMBY template whenever there is a project like this coming online.
Our friends in Australia have the most lithium mines and do the most producing of the product. Following them are places like Red China and some countries in South America. The United States—the world—would be better off with more options.