Local and national conservation groups are suing the U.S. Forest Service for approving the reopening of the Stibnite mine earlier this year, a gold and antimony mining project in central Idaho.
The Idaho Conservation League, the Center for Biological Diversity and four other environmental organizations filed the suit Tuesday, saying the project would jeopardize public health, threaten local species and permanently scar public land in the South Fork Salmon River Watershed.
Bryan Hurlbutt, an attorney for Advocates for the West, which represents the plaintiffs, said the project would double the current size of the mine, representing the equivalent of 2,500 football fields.
“That would be a series of three open pit mines, two of which are located underneath rivers in the area. There would also be a huge mine waste storage facility that would fill up a large, relatively pristine mountain valley,” he said, adding the area is home to Idaho salmon, steelhead and bull trout, which are all threatened species under the Endangered Species Act.
“This would be a major setback for the area that would lead to a long lasting environmental impact,” Hurlbutt said. "It’s really unclear how in the long term the site's going to be put back together and restored. So it was a bit surprising that Fish and Wildlife agencies would sign off on a project like this.”
The mine is located about 45 miles east of McCall. If reopened, it will be the first domestic operation of antimony, a byproduct of gold mining, in the U.S. since 2001.
Citing the eight years of review leading to the project’s approval, Perpetua Resources wrote in an email they were “confident in the U.S. Forest Service’s ability to defend its Record of Decision.”
"The Stibnite Gold Project is critical to our national security and is poised to provide hundreds of family-wage jobs, restore habitat, reconnect fish to their native spawning grounds, clean up legacy contamination, improve water quality and establish the only domestically mined source of antimony,” the company wrote.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife, the Secretary of the Interior and National Fisheries Services, which are also named as defendants in the suit, said they do not comment on pending litigation. The U.S. Department of Agriculture, also a defendant, and the U.S. Forest Service did not answer a request for comment by the time of publication.
