Climate advocates look to Biden
Mining, monuments, energy figure in outline
KAIBAB NATIONAL FOREST, Ariz. – Wind rustles the barbed fence surrounding Canyon Mine as Amber Reimondo patrols its perimeter.
For the last four years under the Trump administration, Reimondo, the energy director for the Grand Canyon Trust, has worked to make the temporary Obama-era uranium mining ban around the Grand Canyon permanent. So far, her efforts have not paid off.
But with an impending change in presidents, Reimondo hopes change is in the wind. “We’re in a vastly better position going into 2021 than we have been in the last four years,” Reimondo said. “It’s really important that in the next few years progress to address these environmental issues and climate change is seriously made. We don’t have many more years before we pass the point of no return.”
The climate plan outlined by President-elect Joe Biden aims to address environmental issues relevant to Arizona and the Southwest, such as public lands, water protection, clean energy and climate change. And while legal experts warn of a difficult political path ahead, politicians, tribal leaders and activists say they’re hopeful about how the incoming administration will focus on the environment.
Canyon Mine, which hasn’t produced uranium ore since its creation in the 1980s, has been the source of constant conflict among the federal government, local tribes, environmental groups and its operator, Energy Fuels Resources.
The 17-acre mine, which has been renamed Pinyon Plain Mine, is only miles away from the Grand Canyon. To safeguard the area’s watershed, Reimondo has been trying to ban the mining operations permanently.
“The groundwater flow is really difficult to predict because it’s a highly fractured region,” Reimondo said. “Allowing contamination to happen to groundwater anywhere around the Grand Canyon, even if it’s not on the rim, could still feasibly find its way into the seeps and springs inside the Grand Canyon and into the Colorado River.”
Since 2012, a planned 20-year mining ban has protected approximately 1 million acres of public land in the vicinity of the Grand Canyon from fresh uranium mining activity.
The ban – also known as the mineral withdrawal – was imposed by President Barack Obama. Reimondo hopes Biden, once Obama’s vice president, will make the ban permanent.
Mining is only mentioned in Biden’s climate plan in connection with his goal to improve environmental collaboration between the U.S. and other countries in North and South America. The plan states that Biden aims to create “new common standards for the greening of manufacturing, mining, and tourism.”
Throughout his presidential campaign, Biden has maintained an antimining rhetoric on social media.
In early August, he tweeted “I can’t believe I have to say this, but we can’t let Donald Trump open up the Grand Canyon for uranium mining.”
With support from the White House and Arizona’s senators, both of whom have publicly opposed mining near the canyon, Reimondo is looking for the passage of the Grand Canyon Centennial Protection Act, which passed the House of Representatives, but came to a standstill in the Senate at the start of 2020.
Even though uranium companies like Energy Fuels Resources were unable to lift the mineral withdrawal under the Trump Administration, they were still able to lobby for the repeal of other Obama-era laws.
In 2017, Trump significantly shrank the size of Bears Ears National Monument in southern Utah. The site was reduced by more than 1.1 million acres, about 85% of its original land.
This decision came less than a year after Obama established the monument. Obama’s proclamation cited the area’s “extraordinary archaeological and cultural record” and the land’s “profoundly sacred” meaning to several Native American tribes.
“When the undoing was done by the Trump Administration, it was very disheartening and hurtful,” said Clark Tenakhongva, vice president of the Hopi Tribe and co-chair of the Bears Ears Inter-tribal Coalition. “The decrease of the national monument left out many well-preserved sites ... that have always been very important to Hopi and Pueblo tribes.”
While the reduction has not led the Bureau of Land Management to approve oil or gas leases on lands cut from the monument, a new claim for a uranium mine was filed. The site, called the Easy Peasy mine, has been reclaimed and dug out.
Besides fresh mining activity, Tenakhongva says the lack of national monument status protection has led to other types of environmental degradation.
Since the 2017 reduction, Tenakhongva has visited several sacred sites, known as kivas, that are now outside of the monument’s protection. He said the establishment of the monument by Obama brought national attention to the area, but the subsequent land reduction by Trump left some of the most sacred sites unprotected.
During his visits Tenakhongva has seen more vandalism, foot traffic and off-road vehicle marks and has read reports of rock climbers and rappelers.
The published Biden-harris Plan for Tribal Nations states the administration’s intent to “take immediate steps to reverse the Trump administration’s assaults on America’s natural treasures.” The list of natural treasures includes both Bears Ears and Grand Staircaseescalante in Utah, as well as the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska.
The use of public lands is critical for another one of Biden’s keystone climate initiatives: clean energy.
By 2050, Biden wants the U.S. to have reached a 100% clean energy economy and net-zero emissions. The climate plan states that over the next decade, Biden will invest $1.7 trillion of federal funds int clean energy.
Arizona state Rep. Kirsten Engel, Dtucson, says the state needs to take advantage of this clean energy push.
“Arizona could really be an economic leader on issues of clean energy. We have some of the best solar energy generation resources here in the world,” Engel said. “Why shouldn’t Arizona get a piece of that investment?”
Environmental coverage at The Arizona Republic is supported by the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust.