Activist Lois Gibbs: RioTinto, Kennecott Sulfide Mine in northern Michigan like Infamous Love Canal
Channel: WAVECleanWater
Date: 10/07/2011

"Mother of the Superfund" Lois Gibbs compared the Upper Peninsula future to infamous Love Canal disaster, during an Oct. 15, 2010 talk at Northern Michigan University (NMU).

It appears officials involved in higher education in Marquette, MI were not thrilled by Gibbs talks that opposed the Kennecott Eagle Minerals nickel and copper mines planned for the Yellow Dog Plains near Lake Superior 

Gibbs talk at NMU almost did not happen because NMU Public Safety officials refused to unlock Jamrich Hall, according to a university employee who propped doors open with a chair and a garbage can.

Meanwhile, Gibbs talk to Marquette high school students was canceled when she refused to promise that the sulfide mine would not cross her lips.
Gibbs NMU presentation was titled "From the Love Canal to Michigan."

Sponsors of Gibbs visit to Marquette include Students for Sustainable Living, Cedar Tree Institute, Save the Wild U.P., Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve.

Gibbs said bad decisions made by political and business leaders in Niagara Falls resulted in birth defects, cancer, the uprooting of families and heartache on many levels. 

"You have a beautiful environment here," said Gibbs, a Nobel Peace Prize Nominee. "You have a place that is worth saving."

"You have a place that has huge potential for green development," said Gibbs, executive director of the nonprofit Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ) in Falls Church, VA.

"You have the opportunity here to think about what is the economic growth and development that you want in the U.P."

Gibbs led a march from Eagle Rock to the mine front gates (Kennecott Eagle Minerals) where a security guard warned protestors they were too close to the site.

Moments before Gibbs arrived with 25 protestors, company officials sent all employees home.

For centuries sacred Eagle Rock was the site of Ojibwa religious observances.
But Kennecott Minerals and its London-based parent company Rio Tinto plan to blast thru it to make an entrance to their underground mine -- the largest site of nickel and copper ever uncovered.

"You (can) stop the economic growth that is not going to benefit the environment," said Gibbs.

"This is not the mine that (your) mama and dad use to work - and grand-pappy used to work at -- this is a much more dangerous mine." said Gibbs, noting that the U.P.'s rich history of above ground iron ore (pit) mining is not as dangerous as underground sulfide mining including the sulfuric acid byproduct. 

"This is a much more dangerous mine and this is a mine that could seriously hurt the water supply, contaminate the lake and become a moonscape," she said.

Niagara Falls, NY city fathers "tried to build the economy on a parallel path" and "I see that here," she said.

"One was attracting tourists to the area," said Gibbs. Niagara Falls is "one of the seven wonders of the world -- it's absolutely breathtaking."

"The second path they were running was an industrial - chemical industry," Gibbs said. "They thought they could run both" but "these are two incompatible paths."

"Because when tourists are standing by a river (and) the fish are floating on top of the Niagara River it doesn't make for good tourism," Gibbs said. "When you are standing there smelling chemicals from the chemical plant it does not make good tourism."

"On the American side (of Niagara Falls) there is nobody there," she said "If you go to the Canadian side it's bustling ."

"Now downtown Niagara Falls is this huge casino where everyone gambles" but "nobody stays."

"A mistake was made in Niagara Falls," Cleveland, Detroit and "a number of cities," said Gibbs. Those are "non-sustainable industrial cities."

"They are now poverty cities" with "drugs, crime (and) destruction -- It's not what you want to do here (in U.P.)," she said.

In 1978, Gibbs found her seven-year-old son's elementary school and neighborhood was built on a 20,000 ton toxic waste dump -- infamous "Love Canal."

The government eventually evacuated 833 families - some victims of unusually high rates of cancer and birth defects.

During her NMU talk, Gibbs offered support to groups battling sulfide mining from her nonprofit Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ).

"CHEJ would be happy to come out and help you," said Gibbs who is continuing her three-decade battle against evil corporations and governments.

Center for Health, Environment and Justice (CHEJ)
Falls Church, VA
www.chej.org
703-237-2249

NMU Students for Sustainable Living
studentsforsustainableliving@gmail.com
269-484-4993

Cedar Tree Institute
www.CedarTreeInstitute.org
906-228-5494

Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve
www.yellowdogwatershed.org
906-361-5179

Save the Wild U.P. (SWUP)
www.savethewildup.org
906-228-4444

Acid mine drainage & other photos courtesy
Carol Stoker, NASA Ames Research Center
The Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness
Save the Wild UP
Greg Peterson, Nonprofit Cedar Tree Institute, volunteer media advisor, 906-401-0109