An Upstream Journey, Dispatch #10: Pebble is Not the Only Mine Endangering Salmon

Written by Paul Moinester

My view from the airplane shows what is endangered by the proposed coal mine.
All photos by Paul Moinester

Peering out the window of the plane, I took a deep breath and tried to soak it all in. The sun was glistening on the expansive mudflats, casting a bright glow over the pristine landscape. To the west, the Alaska Range was commandeering the sky, its snowcapped peaks piercing the clouds. Everywhere the eye could see, serpentine rivers were snaking through the flats on their journey to the Cook Inlet. And though the fish were too small to be seen from the sky, the rivers were teeming with salmon, beckoning me to immerse myself in these pure waters and pursue that heart-stopping tug.

It’s hard to fathom a place so raw, so barren, and so untouched. But it’s even harder to acknowledge the disturbing reality that this landscape is endangered and could soon become an industrial wasteland if PacRim Coal’s proposed Chuitna coal strip mine is given a green light.

If you’re an Orvis News reader, then you’re likely familiar with the proposed Pebble Mine, an enormously controversial proposed copper-and-gold mine in Alaska’s Bristol Bay. But chances are you haven’t heard of the proposed Chuitna Mine, which is a problem. Like Pebble, Chuitna is a proposed massive extractive resource project that, if permitted, will have a devastating effect on Alaska’s wild salmon stocks. But unlike Pebble, few people outside of Alaska have ever heard of the Chuitna Mine. I was blissfully unaware of its existence until I met Sam Weis.

The glistening mudflats of Cook Inlet would be irreparably altered by the project.

Sam is the Communications Director for Alaskans First, a coalition of diverse groups and concerned residents fighting to protect Alaska’s way of life from eight proposed coal-mining projects. A native Wisconsinite and avid fly fisherman, Sam felt the irresistible call of Alaska and moved to Anchorage earlier this year to fight for the preservation of wild salmon (and to fish of course). Fittingly, I met Sam at an event titled, “Eat Salmon. Save Salmon.”

Halfway through explaining my project to him, Sam interrupted and asked if I had heard of the Chuitna Mine project. When I told him I hadn’t, he immediately pulled out his calendar and asked when I could fly out to a remote Alaskan wilderness to visit the proposed mine site. He sweetened the deal by promising we could spend a few hours chasing silver salmon fresh from the ocean. How could I say no to that?

A week later, we were crammed into the back of a Cessna Skywagon bound for the tiny town of Beluga. Only a forty-minute flight west of Anchorage, Beluga is emblematic of what springs to mind when you imagine a remote Alaskan outpost. It has 17 to 21 fulltime residents – the variance is due to one family that sometimes flies south for the winter. The town’s runway is a gravel road that doubles as Main Street. The post office is a converted cargo container with a dozen or so mailboxes tacked to the side.

The post office in Beluga, Alaska.

We were met at the “airport” by Terry Jorgensen, a commercial set-net fisherman. We tossed our gear into the back of his old, beat-up pickup truck, bounced along the bumpy roads to the coast, hopped on ATVs, and raced down the rocky shoreline to his fishing spot. With the rhythmic sound of waves crashing in the background, Terry exhaustively detailed the plans for the proposed project. As I listened to excruciating detail after detail, I struggled to understand how this horrific project has flown under the national conservation radar for so long.

Chuitna is unprecedented in both its size and blatant environmental disregard. The scope of the coal mine is unmatched anywhere in Alaska. If approved, it would be the state’s largest coal strip mine. It’s also the first coal project in Alaska to have the audacity to propose mining directly through a salmon stream. PacRim’s plan is to completely remove 11 miles of streambed and more than 300 feet of underlying soil and rock strata.

That’s not just conjecture about potential impacts. PacRim fully acknowledges that this project will remove 11 miles of prolific salmon stream. The threatened 11-mile stretch is called Middle Creek and produces roughly 20 percent of the silver salmon for the entire Chuitna River system. It has been labeled by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game as critical habitat. It would vanish if the project were approved.

Terry (standing) explains some aspects of the destructive mine proposal for Sam.

To make matters worse, the streams not directly plowed through by PacRim will be inundated daily with millions of gallons of groundwater from the mine pit. This daily deluge will disrupt natural stream flows and alter the rivers’ sedimentation, making this prime ecosystem less inhabitable for egg rearing. Moreover, it would destroy thousands of acres of pristine wetlands and forest that are important habitat for bear, moose, upland birds, and waterfowl.

The impact of the mine would be felt miles beyond the proposed site, courtesy of an 8-mile conveyor belt that stretches into Cook Inlet. This nasty tentacle of infrastructure would deliver millions of pounds of coal to a large manmade island that will store it until enormous vessels pull up to the 2-mile dock, get loaded up with coal, and head across the Pacific to Asia. This intense infrastructure network would fundamentally alter the seascape, disrupting the migration of salmon and, according to Terry, put him and all of his fellow commercial fishermen out of business.

The scariest part is that everything I have described is just Phase One. If approved, Chuitna would open the floodgates for PacRim to expand their project and for other companies to start exercising their claims on the coal-laden watershed. PacRim’s initial plan impacts 15 square miles of the watershed. Phases Two and Three would increase their footprint to over 32 square miles. And the Beluga Coal Company would likely exercise their claim to an additional 17,686 acres of leases, bringing the grand total to 60 square miles of destruction.

All those blue lines beneath the colored portions spell danger for salmon.

Needing a pick-me-up after Terry’s depressing depiction, Sam and I headed to the mouth of the Chuitna to set up camp and fish for a few hours. Our timing with the tides was not ideal, and we only managed to sneak in an hour of fishing before slack tide hit and the fishing died down. We were able to elicit a few aggressive follows from some chromers but no takes. While we yearned to feel that magical, powerful tug, we didn’t need to hook into any silvers to appreciate the magnificence of this resource.

The following morning we gobbled down a quick breakfast of camp stove oatmeal and rushed out to see Terry’s haul from the morning. As we pulled up, he was laying out the five species of Pacific salmon—kings, sockeyes, cohos, chums, and pinks—that he had caught that morning. There are only a handful of places left in the world with strong wild salmon runs. There are even fewer that receive prolific runs of all five Pacific species. And hardly any spots left where you can catch all five species in one day. The Chuitna watershed is one of them: it’s the rarest of rarities.

Yet this rare gem is staring down the barrel of destruction. And for what? The carbon buried deep beneath the Chuitna watershed is the lowest grade coal on the planet. It’s of such poor quality that no market exists for it in the United States. Every pound pulled out from beneath a salmon stream is bound for Asia. And it’s all done at a huge cost to Alaskans.

The author casts as the tide recedes and the sun sets over the beautiful Chuitna watershed.

A study released by the Center for Sustainable Economy concluded that for every $1 of economic output the project would create, there would be $5.84 of economic losses. So for every $1 generated by things like taxes, royalties, and job creation, there is nearly $6 of economic losses in the form of environmental damage, reclamation costs, and lost economic opportunity. And that’s just the economic losses. These lopsided figures don’t even include the incalculable cost of losing irreplaceable resources like some of the last vestiges of wild salmon and pristine wilderness.

As we bade farewell to Terry, he left us with one last unnerving statement: “The only reason Alaska is the last viable commercial salmon fishery is because it was the last to be discovered.” Those are stark words coming from a guy who is a student of the global salmon industry and whose livelihood is tied to the health of Alaska’s salmon fishery.

Rather than viewing that statement as a depressing inevitability, we need to see it as an opportunity and as a challenge. It’s easy to analyze the state of Alaska’s salmon fisheries and think Terry’s grave words are coming to fruition. Across the Last Frontier, projects like Pebble and Chuitna are on the table, and if approved, they would irrevocably harm some of the world’s best remaining salmon runs.

Heading back to camp through the wetlands as the moon rises over this incredibly fishery.

But concerned Alaskans, commercial fishermen, and committed outdoorsmen possess the ability to stem the tidal wave of extractive resource destruction. Anglo American’s recent announcement to withdraw their 50 percent ownership stake in Pebble Mine, a significant blow to this horrendous project, is proof positive of our communal power.

That announcement sent a loud and clear message that our collective voices and actions are a force to be reckoned with. It proved that the influence of multi-billion dollar industrial giants can be squelched by the concerns of the people. And it most certainly put PacRim Coal on notice. It’s time they feel the pain of our collective power. The fate of one of the last great salmon fisheries depends on it.

To learn more about the proposed Chuitna Coal Mine, please visit Alaskans First’s website. You can help protect the Chuitna watershed from this destructive project by clicking on the “Protect Wild Salmon” tab and sending a note to the Environmental Protection Agency asking agency leaders to deny any permit to mine through a wild salmon stream.

The Chuitna offers commercial fishermen and anglers the chance to catch all five species of Pacific salmon.