The Tucson Audubon Society has requested that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers deny a crucial Clean Water Act permit needed for the proposed Rosemont Copper Mine because of environmental threats to its internationally-famous birding center near Patagonia.
The Paton Center for Hummingbirds is located in the Sonoita Creek riparian zone immediately downstream from Rosemont’s proposed massive construction project in the creek.
Toronto-based Hudbay Minerals Inc., which owns Rosemont Copper, is proposing to reconstruct the Sonoita Creek floodway with the goal of obtaining mitigation credits from the Army Corps.
The credits would be used to compensate for the destruction of desert aquatic resources by the proposed Rosemont open-pit copper mine planned for the Santa Rita Mountains on the Coronado National Forest southeast of Tucson. The mile-wide, half-mile deep open pit mine would dump waste rock and tailings on more than 2,500 acres of national forest and destroy rare desert riparian waterways.
“A large part of the planned mitigation is located on Sonoita Creek Ranch, where Hudbay proposes ambitious rehabilitation measures to reconfigure the main channel of Sonoita Creek by cutting a new channel and plugging and backfilling the current incised channel,” states the society’s May 4 letter to Brig. General D. Peter Helmlinger, Commander of the Army Corp’s South Pacific Division.
The society’s letter states it “supports denial” of the Clean Water Act Section 404 Permit because Hudbay’s proposed mitigation plan would have “direct, indirect cumulative, and related downstream impacts, which are unaccounted for in the plan, (that) could directly adversely affect our Center.”
“Downstream impacts could include damages caused by sedimentation or erosion following storm events both during and after construction at Sonoita Creek Ranch,” the society’s letter states.
The society says it was not contacted during Hudbay’s preparation of its proposed Habitat Mitigation and Monitoring Plan (HMMP) for the Rosemont Mine even though the plan would have a direct impact on the group’s bird sanctuary.
“Aspects of the HMMP design are deeply concerning to our organization because of the likelihood of failure,” the society’s letter states.
The group cites a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Nov. 30, 2017 letter where the EPA found significant flaws with Hudbay’s mitigation design.
The EPA letter describes the project as a “massive undertaking” of excavation, filling, and re-contouring of almost 300,000 cubic yards of excavated floodplain soils resulting in inevitable impacts of heavy equipment, compacting sensitive soils, disrupting existing topography, and creating significant piles of soil and alluvial sediment, according to the society.
“The EPA points out that the mitigation goals are inappropriate for the site,” states the society’s letter signed by Jonathan Lutz, executive director, Jonathan Horst, director of conservation and research, and Nicole Gillett, conservation advocate.
The society also points to an independent consultant to Save the Scenic Santa Ritas, a non-profit citizen’s group opposing the Rosemont Copper Mine, who analyzed the project and asserted that the channel design was likely to fail.
The bird conservation group requested that if the Army Corps does not deny the permit, that it conduct additional environmental studies on potential downstream impacts that are likely to occur.
The Army Corps’ Los Angeles district office recommended against issuing the 404 permit in July 2016 because of shortfalls in a previous version of Hudbay’s mitigation plan.
The district determined the project would “cause or contribute to” violations of Arizona water quality standards and trigger “significant degradation” of federally regulated washes, the Arizona Daily Star reported on Jan. 14, 2017. The Army Corps notified Hudbay of the shortfalls in a Dec. 28, 2016, letter.
Hudbay subsequently prepared a revised Habit Mitigation and Monitoring Plan released in Sept. 2017 that includes the massive restructuring of Sonoita Creek.
IT IS TIME THAT THE OPPOSITION FORCES AGAINST THE ROSEMONT PROJECT BECOME UNITED INTO ONE POWERFUL VOICE .
THE MORE FRAGMENTED THE OPPOSITION IS , FOR WHATEVER REASON , THE WEAKER IT BECOMES .
LOOK FOR A LEADER AND RALLY BEHIND .