Tribal Group Appeals DEC Permit for Gold Dredging

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Category: News

Created on Monday, 09 December 2024 15:21

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By MAX GRAHAM
Northern Journal
    A western Alaska tribal consortium has appealed a key permit for a proposed gold dredging project in waters near Nome.
    Kawerak, a nonprofit that serves some 20 Iñupiaq and Yup’ik tribes in the Bering Strait region, last month asked state regulators for a hearing on a wastewater discharge permit for the project.
    The permit, a federal Clean Water Act authorization that’s administered by the state, would allow the Las Vegas-based company behind the project, IPOP, to discharge a limited amount of pollutants into an estuary about 30 miles from Nome, in the scenic Safety Sound area.
    In its appeal, Kawerak says the Department of Environmental Conservation, the state agency that issued the permit, “failed to consider the project’s effect on the surrounding Native communities” in its analysis.
    The appeal says that IPOP’s development would come “at the direct expense of the Native economy” and that “local Native subsistence and cultural practices will be directly and adversely affected — if not outright destroyed.”
    IPOP’s project is opposed by several regional and local groups, including Bering Straits Native Corporation and the City of Nome.
    Last spring, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved a different permit for the project, reversing an earlier decision to deny it.
    Northern Journal contributor Max Graham can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . He’s interested in any and all mining related stories, as well as introductory meetings with people in and around the industry.
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This article was originally published in Northern Journal, a newsletter from Nathaniel Herz.

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