The president and chief executive officer of Northern
Dynasty Minerals, Ltd., in Vancouver, British Columbia, announced this past
week that his company has acquired Anglo American (US) Pebble LLC’s interest in
the Pebble Limited Partnership, based in Anchorage.
Ronald Thiessen said all members of Anglo American, the
London-based international mining concern, have resigned from the Pebble
Partnership board.
Northern Dynasty has maintained that the mine can be
developed an operated in a responsible manner in harmony with the fisheries of
Southwest Alaska, in particular the Bristol Bay watershed salmon.
Opponents of the mine have challenged that assessment, and
the US Environmental Protection Agency is in the process of finalizing its
report on how a mine of that size would potentially affect fisheries in the
area of the Bristol Bay watershed.
The most recent comments about the Bristol Bay draft
watershed assessment are online at http://www2.epa.gov/bristolbay
According to the draft report, the affects would include the
loss of up to 90 miles of streams, altered stream flow due to retention and
discharge of water used in the mine operations and loss of up to 4,800 acres of
wetlands.
Thiessen said his company’s current focus is to consolidate
all the technical data, engineering work and permitting documentation related
to Pebble, with the goal of qualifying and securing a new partner in 2014. He
said that a final decision on permit filing would be made in the coming year by
Northern Dynasty’s board of directors. Northern Dynasty meanwhile has launched
a new website to present its stand on the project, at www.northerndynastyminerals.com
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