(CN) — The Ninth Circuit sided with the Bureau of Land Management and a mining company in a dispute brought by environmentalists and Native American tribes in an attempt to stop a massive lithium mine at Thacker Pass in Northern Nevada near the Oregon border.
Lithium Nevada Corporation is mining the largest known lithium deposit in the U.S. Lithium is an essential component for making batteries for electric vehicles, a big part of the Biden administration’s effort to lessen the country’s dependence on fossil fuels.
Environmentalists sued, saying the mine would have detrimental effects on wildlife, including mule deer, Lahontan cutthroat trout and pronghorn. Also threatened is the water and riparian habitats essential to wildlife, according to the plaintiffs, which include Western Watersheds Project, Wildlands Defense, Great Basin Resource Watch and Basin and Range Watch.
The court said in its decision that the bureau and Lithium Nevada followed all the environmental protocols.
“The Bureau of Land Management did not abuse its discretion in determining that the record of decision does not authorize violations of applicable water quality standards. The record of decision states that the bureau conditioned its approval on Lithium Nevada Corporation’s compliance with monitoring groundwater sources according to the Nevada Division of Environmental Protection and maintaining water quality and quantity for wildlife, livestock and human consumption to the state of Nevada standards,” the court wrote.
Laura Granier, attorney for Lithium Nevada, told a three-judge appellate panel in July that the company spent nearly $9 million on environmental studies and the permitting process while following the law. She said no expense was spared and no corners were cut. Between legal costs, environmental studies and start-up construction costs, Granier said Lithium Nevada has spend more than $150 million.
“Lithium Nevada took the extraordinary measure of pausing this project for two years before it ever got this authorization because it did a couple of million dollars of exploration so that it could relocate the entire project outside of the Montana Mountains, where there is sensitive environmental areas for sage grouse and other resources. Those are extraordinary measures of avoidance and mitigation that the appellants simply ignore,” Granier said.
Environmentalists claimed the bureau expedited the project to “streamline environmental review” for quick approval by the Trump administration.
The Thacker Pass project covers nearly 18,000 acres of land, and a total direct disturbance footprint would be approximately 6,000 acres, according to environmentalists. The mine will have a 41-year life.
“The Final Environmental Impact Report contained a reasonably complete discussion of possible mitigation measures for groundwater pollution, wildlife impacts (such as mitigation efforts for migratory birds, raptors, big game, nongame, and special status species), air pollution, and groundwater quantity, in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act," the court wrote in its decision.
The court also said the bureau “properly described baseline conditions” for pronghorn antelope, greater sage-grouse and other wildlife in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act.
Environmentalists had their own thoughts on the process.
“They violated the law on numerous occasions, both on what the district court found and what the district court never got to,” the plaintiffs’ attorney Roger Flynn told the three-judge appellate panel in July. "This is the first time in public land history that we have a major project violating a number of provisions allowed to go forward.”
Flynn said the area will not be wildlife habitat during and after the miners are through.
The Reno-Sparks Indian Colony, Burns Paiute Tribe and ATSA Koodakuh Wyh Nuwu People of Red Mountain are also plaintiffs in the case .
The Burns Paiute Tribe said they weren’t listened to by the bureau regarding the mine in the preliminary stages.
But the court backed the federal agency.
In its decision, the court wrote that “the bureau contacted the Burns Paiute Tribe for consultation for an ethnographic assessment for the Winnemucca Resource Management Plan (RMP), which encompassed this area. The Burns Paiute Tribe did not respond to these contacts; instead, its representative responded that the Burns Paiute Tribe ‘would defer consultation to the tribes that had reservations closer to the study area’ and did not need to remain on the mailing list.”
“During the four other projects involving the Thacker Pass Project area, the bureau never had any information that the Burns Paiute Tribe claimed a cultural, religious, or historical interest in the project area," the court continued.
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