Issues of Concern

The Tangle Lakes country contains unique biological cultural resources. Its wide, open tundra meadows, glacial lakes and ridges are favorite destinations for Alaskans and visitors. Snow machining, berry picking, birding, hunting, fishing, hiking, climbing, and paddling are just some of the ways people enjoy and benefit from the land and its biological resources. Some of the many sources of the Gulkana River – a major salmon-bearing river in south central Alaska – originate in the high mountains of this country, and it contains an important migration corridor for the Nelchina Caribou Herd.

Grizzly bears, moose, wolves, lynx and wolverine are plentiful. Migratory waterfowl, shorebirds and songbirds flock to its tundra ponds and meadows during the short northern summer. According the Alaska Bird Observatory, Tangle Lakes is important habitat for the Arctic Warbler. Alaska is the only place in North America where this species occurs, and the Tangle Lakes area, as one of the most accessible locations – offers birders and scientists abundant opportunities to observe mating and nesting behavior of this and numerous other bird species.

Pure Nickel’s claims encompass the northern third of the Tangle Lakes Archeological District – which contains one of the densest collections of Native American prehistoric and historic sub-arctic artifacts in North America.

Tangle Lakes

This archeological heritage emphasizes the fact that people have used Tangle Lakes country for over 10,000 years – usage which in the past 100 years included placer mining for gold on its many creeks. But this mining has been of a much smaller scale and extent than the type of hardrock mining Pure Nickel would do.

Today’s hardrock mines, especially strip mines, cover thousands of acres, have large ancillary processing facilities, and require an extensive network of roads and power lines. Modern mines pump and use vast quantities of water which can result in aquifer depletion and contamination, and typically use as much power to process ore as a city of about 25,000 residents.

These mines also “privatize” public lands, such as those near Tangle Lakes and at Rainbow Mountain, by denying public access during the life of the mine. And while the law requires a mining company reclaim a mine site after closure, this doesn’t mean the landscape isn’t permanently altered. Strip mining results in large open pits (some of the largest can be over a mile wide), waste rock dumps covering hundreds of acres and sacrificed stream drainages used as permanent storage for contaminated tailings and mine waste.

The issue of hardrock mining in the Tangle Lakes country is not whether such a mine could be done in an environmentally protective way by using cutting edge technology. The primary issue is that this type of large-scale industrial activity cannot occur in this open, sweeping landscape without destroying existing values. Current recreational and subsistence activities in the area, as well as the quality of life presently enjoyed by locals, and the economic benefits, both local and statewide, from tourism, depend on the land remaining much like it is today. These values exceed the hypothetical mineral value that might be found in the MAN Project.

Drill pads and roads at the True North gold deposit in Fairbanks, AK

Not every place that can be mined should be mined. Other cultural, social, biological and economic factors must be considered when an area is opened to mineral entry. In the case of the Tangle Lakes country, one type of mining – small scale placer mining – has integrated with other current uses without significant adverse impacts. Modern strip mining cannot.