Most of them have sold their power rights to data centers, Alcoa had huge long term power contracts the we’re worth more than doing business in many locations.
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Boundary Waters Situation
- Thread starter Newk
- Start date
Most of them have sold their power rights to data centers, Alcoa had huge long term power contracts the we’re worth more than doing business in many locations.
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littlebigtine
WKR
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- Apr 3, 2021
- Messages
- 621
I know what the original saying was. I changed the saying to emphasize the point that I thought certain people in this thread where focused on the wrong thing entirely when complaining about “non-profit orgs” and influencers ruining western big game hunting. Sorry you didnt pick that up.
My point is that the single most important ingredient that we have control over to protect and conserve big game populations in the US is protecting habitat. What that looks like can be many things but the boundary waters situation sets a precedent that could create serious fallout moving forward.
As far as deer hunters afield, what exactly are you arguing? Ive seen graphs from Idaho, Utah that show sharp declines in hunter participation around the harsh winters in the 90s. The numbers have for the most part been restored while the deer population has struggled.
My point is that while hunter recruitment is steady and overall hunter population had had a modest growth trend. Deer population has declined the last 30 years.
You tell me who's fault is that? Randy Newburg? He seems like his life impact would be small change at best. Or nothing. Stepping over dollars(habitat protections) to pick up nothing(Randy Newburg, BHA).
wowzers
WKR
- Joined
- Nov 22, 2012
- Messages
- 538
I don’t think it’s accurate to say they closed because power was worth more than operating. They closed because operational cost were too high here. I’m going to guess due to the onerous regulations we have vs overseas. Selling access to the power infrastructure is better than nothing for a company.
From smelters to servers: Alcoa to cash in on crypto’s thirst for energy
Alcoa is in advanced negotiations to sell its dormant Massena East smelter in upstate New York to Bitcoin mining firm NYDIG.
Dos Perros
WKR
Is it your contention that more useless regulation is the answer?
Holding mining companies accountable and not letting them walk away from huge messes would be a start. Same could be said for almost every extraction industry. Go walk a fresh logging job and look at the trash you’ll find; oil jugs, Red Bull and monster cans, cans of chew, broken cables, gas cans, hydraulic fluid spills. I’d get a littering ticket or worse if I left that trash in the woods. For them it’s just part of doing business I guess
^^^^ This
I totally understand the Not in My Back Yard thinking, but what are we going to do 50 -75-100 years from now when all the other mines that are not in your back yard are all mined out? If we want to continue to live the type of life style we have created in the modern USA/world., we will need to figure out a way to get all of these minerals responsibly. It could be done if it was given priority - Take the millions/billions of fraud right there in Minnesota and put it towards responsible mining. Say the hell with trying to get to Mars and use those funds....etc, etc.
Dos Perros
WKR
So it sounds like enforcement is needed more than regulation.
Backyard
WKR
Correct. But enforcement doesn’t work when those on top are pulling strings for their buddies. As is pretty much what’s going on here.
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Dos Perros
WKR
It sounds like you're implying the executive branch of government can just do whatever it wants?
Pacific_Fork
Well Known Rokslider
I would either rather not have all this tech and data centers or whatever else we don’t need to survive, or pay double if it meant we didn’t completely rape every last ecosystem in the US/world. We are a bloated society addicted to buying useless crap for cheap.
Jdeck09
Lil-Rokslider
- Joined
- Dec 4, 2020
- Messages
- 183
I am not anti mining but the fact that its going to a foreign company is my problem. We all know how it plays out if it goes wrong.
At least if American companies were involved, we might have a little accountability.
Overall, I dont see any reason to put such an important piece of wilderness at risk.
At least if American companies were involved, we might have a little accountability.
Overall, I dont see any reason to put such an important piece of wilderness at risk.
littlebigtine
WKR
- Joined
- Apr 3, 2021
- Messages
- 621
Natural food systems will prove more valuable in the future than minerals or energy. Unlike extractive resources, they are regenerative, but only if we treat them that way.
The core problem is one of undervaluation. When americans fail to assign adequate economic value to natural food systems, market forces steadily erode them. As these systems shrink in size and accessibility, more people are priced or pushed out, forced to rely on alternatives. That displacement then accelerates the very trend it was caused by, as investment flows toward industrial agriculture food production rather than the use,restoration and protection of natural systems.
The end state of this trajectory is a food landscape stripped of biodiversity: monoculture crops, industrial feedlots, and engineered inputs replacing what were once self sustaining, complex ecosystems. The irony is that these industrial systems are far more fragile than the natural ones they replace, vulnerable to disease, climate disruption, and supply chain failure in ways that biodiverse systems are not.
It would be easy to lay blame primarily on consumers and American consumption habits do fuel these destructive economies. But consumers largely choose within the options available to them and those options are shaped by the economic model itself. The model drives the ship more than any individual at the helm.
That leaves government as perhaps the only institution with the scale and authority to counteract forces this powerful. Regulation, land protection, true cost accounting for environmental damage, and meaningful subsidies for regenerative practices are tools that exist, simply underused or actively undermined by the same economic interests they need to constrain. I would argue that government’s most powerful defense is assigning value, protection and ultimately keeping these wild food systems as intact as possible.
The longer this is delayed, the fewer intact natural systems will remain working and worth protecting.
Or the quicker the US becomes a shell of what it used to be, entirely farmed for corn, soy and beef.
The core problem is one of undervaluation. When americans fail to assign adequate economic value to natural food systems, market forces steadily erode them. As these systems shrink in size and accessibility, more people are priced or pushed out, forced to rely on alternatives. That displacement then accelerates the very trend it was caused by, as investment flows toward industrial agriculture food production rather than the use,restoration and protection of natural systems.
The end state of this trajectory is a food landscape stripped of biodiversity: monoculture crops, industrial feedlots, and engineered inputs replacing what were once self sustaining, complex ecosystems. The irony is that these industrial systems are far more fragile than the natural ones they replace, vulnerable to disease, climate disruption, and supply chain failure in ways that biodiverse systems are not.
It would be easy to lay blame primarily on consumers and American consumption habits do fuel these destructive economies. But consumers largely choose within the options available to them and those options are shaped by the economic model itself. The model drives the ship more than any individual at the helm.
That leaves government as perhaps the only institution with the scale and authority to counteract forces this powerful. Regulation, land protection, true cost accounting for environmental damage, and meaningful subsidies for regenerative practices are tools that exist, simply underused or actively undermined by the same economic interests they need to constrain. I would argue that government’s most powerful defense is assigning value, protection and ultimately keeping these wild food systems as intact as possible.
The longer this is delayed, the fewer intact natural systems will remain working and worth protecting.
Or the quicker the US becomes a shell of what it used to be, entirely farmed for corn, soy and beef.
Thehillbillee
FNG
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2024
- Messages
- 52
Letting a foreign nation come into your land and take your precious minerals kinda seems like what happened in Mexico and South America by the Spanish Empire. Didn’t really seem to help the security of any of those indigenous nations.
If these minerals are really critical to our national security then we should keep them. If that means leaving them in the ground because we don’t have the means to mine them and the process them in our country, then so be it. At least we’ll still possess them.
This national security argument is bs. It’s just a card they’re playing to justify their actions because they lack anything better.
If these minerals are really critical to our national security then we should keep them. If that means leaving them in the ground because we don’t have the means to mine them and the process them in our country, then so be it. At least we’ll still possess them.
This national security argument is bs. It’s just a card they’re playing to justify their actions because they lack anything better.
CJ19
WKR
- Joined
- Nov 25, 2018
- Messages
- 527
The conservation and environmental community has spent decades pushing policy that has directly led to this increasing in mining, the prevalence of foreign mining companies, and the need to outsource smelting and other processing procedures. Most notably, for 25 years now, the foremost important issue for the existence of the human species as pushed by the conservation and environmental community has been stopping muh climate change. Sorry, to inform all the conservationists here....this is what you asked for and signed up for. The conservation/environmental community made this bed. Sorry to tell you.
As far as the "This national security argument is bs" statement...Utter hogwash easily refuted by both common knowledge as well as robust government research and publications. The US critical minerals program spans multiple administrations and has support from many high ranking officials on both sides of the isle. Here is a screenshot of the executive summary for the 2010 DoE Report Executive (thats Obama Administration for all the "its a trump conspiracy" people). The Critical Minerals Program under DoE has numerous reports and other literature that expressly refers to critical minerals as a national security issue. Here is a link to the critical minerals website so people can review this information and be rest assured it is not a conspiracy that there are mineral shortages and mineral demand to meet emerging technology and demand. There is plenty of updated information for 2025 and 2026 relevant to the Critical Minerals Program.
Critical Minerals and Materials Program
The DOE Critical Minerals & Materials Program coordinates RD&D into strategic resources across DOE.
Please note the conclusions from 15 years ago:
Its main conclusions include:
• Several clean energy technologies—including wind turbines, electric vehicles, photovoltaiccells and fluorescent lighting—use materials at risk of supply disruptions in the short term. Those risks will generally decrease in the medium and long term.
• Clean energy technologies currently constitute about 20 percent of global consumption ofcritical materials. As clean energy technologies are deployed more widely in the decades ahead, their share of global consumption of critical materials will likely grow.
• Of the materials analyzed, five rare earth metals (dysprosium, neodymium, terbium,europium and yttrium), as well as indium, are assessed as most critical in the short term. Forth is purpose, “criticality” is a measure that combines importance to the clean energy economy and risk of supply disruption.
• Sound policies and strategic investments can reduce the risk of supply disruptions, especially in the medium and long term.
Thehillbillee
FNG
- Joined
- Dec 15, 2024
- Messages
- 52
Thanks for all the info. You’re clearly very informed on this issue. (More so than I am anyway.)
Or are you saying conservationists are big pushers of wind, solar, Ev’s? (This has not been my experience, but even if it were true I don’t see how this puts any blame on them for the foreign involvement.)
Does this mean conservationists pushed for foreign involvement directly, or just demanded more regulation and enforcement to protect the environments in and adjacent to the locations of these minerals and the facilities they were being processed? If its the former I’d like to see more info to back that up. If it’s the latter I don’t think you can blame conservationists.
Or are you saying conservationists are big pushers of wind, solar, Ev’s? (This has not been my experience, but even if it were true I don’t see how this puts any blame on them for the foreign involvement.)
I’m not saying these minerals aren’t critical. I think they are. I’m saying that it doesn’t help our national security to let them be taken from our possession and sent to a nation that is one of our biggest national security threats.
Jpsmith1
WKR
I would say that, due to the fact that a non-american company is doing the extraction and refining, the "these are critical resources" kind of fails the sniff test.
They are SOOO critical, in fact, that we are allowing a Chilean company to come and extract them, thus giving THAT nation great power and influence over those resources in the future. BRILLIANT!!
To be clear, I am 100% opposed to this nonsense and am of the opinion that those who are enabling it should be executed for their crimes against future humanity.
But, yeah, let's keep pretending it's about "critical resources" or whatever other nonsense we're being told while other countries are draining our resources, taking the money AND leaving us with the mess and likely the cleanup bill.
yfarm
WKR
The ironies abound in this statement given the actions of the governor and AG in Minnesota.
Backyard
WKR
And? What exactly does this mean. What does me being from Minn have to do with this other than the fact that I’ve paddled hundreds of miles in the BWCAW, and know firsthand what we have to lose. If you can’t say the same, and are just poking an uneducated jab, sit it out.
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