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Wisconsin’s Mining Moratorium Under Attack
Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker and the mining industry have begun a major lobbying effort to overturn Wisconsin’s landmark Mining Moratorium Law. The law, also known as Wisconsin’s “Prove it First” law, was developed to address the problem of acid mine drainage from metallic sulfide mining.
The law requires that before the state can issue a permit for mining of sulfide ore bodies, prospective miners must first provide an example of where a metallic sulfide mine in the United States or Canada has not polluted surface or groundwater during or after mining. So far, the industry has not been able to find a single example where they have mined without polluting water. A recent study of metallic sulfide regulation in the Great Lakes region by the National Wildlife Federation (http://www.Nwf.org/Mining Report) called Wisconsin’s “Prove it First” regulation an exemplary law.
Tagged with: mining, moratorium, sulfide mining, wisconsin
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