When the Zortman Landusky gold and silver mine, located upstream from Montana’s enormous Fort Belknap reservation, went bankrupt in 1998, the cost of the cleanup fell on the US taxpayer. The costs keep growing.



“Toxic pollution from the Zortman Landusky mine has contaminated nearly a dozen streams in the Little Rocky mountains and harmed the Assiniboine and Gros Ventre tribes that live downstream,” Bonnie Gestring, a staffer with Earthworks, a member of the Western Mining Action Network, said.

In order to stop future such abuses, the Obama administration moved to require hard rock mining operations to prove they had the financial means to clean up future pollution. The rule, published just three days after Obama left office, was meant to aid cash-strapped “Superfund” cleanups of areas contaminated by hazardous waste and was aimed at an industry with a long history of polluting streams and groundwater and leaving taxpayers to foot the cleanup bill.

Now the Trump administration – cheered by mining firms – has moved to transfer the cost of cleaning up back to federal and state agencies.

Last week Scott Pruitt, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, dropped the Obama-era rule, claiming modern mining practices, as well as other state and federal requirements, made the financial responsibility rule superfluous. “Additional financial assurance requirements are unnecessary and would impose an undue burden on this important sector of the American economy and rural America, where most of these mining jobs are based,” he said.

The move was lauded by the Western Governors’ Association – which said states already had financial responsibility requirements in place – and received support from the governors of Arizona, Idaho and Nevada and from the National Mining Association.

Critics of the rule reversal, including a host of community and state-level activist groups, are adamant that the move has left taxpayers wide open to exploitation.

“The draft rule, which was issued in December 2016, clearly documented that toxic and hazardous releases continue to occur, despite current mining practices,” Gestring said. “The Trump administration simply chose to ignore that data in making its decision to abandon these taxpayer protection regulations for mining.”

Elimination of the rule is a big about-face for the federal government, which had – before Donald Trump took office – expressed alarm that funding for the cleanup of contaminated sites had outstripped the cost of cleanup.

The Western Organization of Resource Councils has been pushing for mining law reform for years because, it says, when money for cleanup isn’t available from mining companies, the taxpayer-funded EPA assumes financial responsibility. But if Trump gets his way, the agency will have its budget cut by about $2.5bn for fiscal year 2018, leaving fewer resources available for oversight and cleanup should the unforeseen occur.

“These rules are essential because the liabilities covered by the EPA program – such as spills, natural resource damages and health risk assessments – are generally not covered by other state and federal land management financial assurance programs,” Gestring said. “Pruitt’s decision has nothing to do with toxic cleanup and everything to do with his industry-first agenda. It makes a mockery of Pruitt’s pledged prioritization of Superfund.”

Reform of hard rock mining regulation – most of which was set by a bill signed into law by President Ulysses Grant, in 1872, and has remained unchanged since then –has for years been an uphill battle.

A new bill, the Hardrock Mining and Reclamation Act, has been introduced in Congress and goes far beyond the rule instituted by the Obama administration. It would require, for the first time ever, that hard rock miners pay the government royalties on the minerals they extract, as well as pay a reclamation fee on extracted minerals to cover the cost of covering up old mines. To date, hundreds of thousands of abandoned mines left by long-departed miners cover the west. Many are hazards to recreational users of federal land.

Senator Tom Udall, who introduced the legislation, cited the Gold King Mine spill, which led to 3m gallons of heavy-metals-laced mine wastewater spilling into the Animas and San Juan rivers, as a major factor in his efforts to reform mining law.

“It’s time to end the antiquated sweetheart deal that hardrock mining companies have enjoyed for nearly 150 years,” Udall said in a statement in September. “Like oil, gas, and coal producers, mining companies need to pay their fair share, but because our mining laws date back to the Gold Rush era, it’s the taxpayers who are on the hook for cleaning up hundreds of thousands of abandoned mines that are poisoning our watersheds and threatening our communities.”

The bill has yet to progress and faces stiff opposition. The National Mining Association decried the proposed legislation and said it would result in lower output and fewer jobs from American mining companies and increase domestic dependence upon foreign mineral resources.

But perception of mining operations depends varies by locale. In San Miguel County, Colorado, where long-dormant mines still pose a threat to water quality, the Sheep Mountain Alliance has kept tabs on public health hazards. Lexi Tuddenham, executive director of SMA, said the Pruitt’s moves removed a layer of accountability meant to protect taxpayers from future liability.

“Like many things that are happening at EPA right now, it’s very disturbing –especially for an area like ours that has long history of mining and problems with contamination,” she said. “Human construction isn’t infallible. There’s always the possibility for leaks or misunderstandings of hydrology, and you always need to be able to do something about it as a very basic guarantee for human health and safety.”

Tuddenham said that although some communities in San Miguel County, Colorado, look at mines in terms of jobs and economic benefits, there’s a bigger picture.

“We are certainly still dealing with cleanup from older mines,” she said. “There are companies looking to expand operations in our area, but we’re still dealing with damage from the past.”