Waiting on finalization of protections for Bristol Bay

Bristol Bay is home to Sockeye salmon, brown bears, birds, walruses, seals, and more. It’s a robust region that has largely been spared the harsher touches of industrialization. For the last couple of decades, a mining company has been trying to open the Pebble Mine in some of the headwaters of the bay. If successful, the mine would be an open-pit the size of Manhattan, and require the construction of new roads and a pipeline. This project would damage the ecosystem, and could be devastating to the salmon that feed everything and everyone in the region from the soil to the people.

 In early December, after our coalition of environmental groups, sport anglers, commercial fishing operations, tribes, restaurateurs and more submitted over half a million comments, the EPA took the penultimate step in protecting Bristol Bay from the Pebble Mine. They plan to issue a final determination by January 30th, 2023.