Peel Watershed News

Mayo, Dawson FNs ink deal with Yukon miners

2011-11-21T11:02:00.000-08:00

In what may mark a significant turning point for Peel protection, the Yukon Chamber of Mines has agreed to work with the Na-cho Nyak Dun and Tr’ondek Hwech’in First Nations “for their mutual benefit.”

Blackstone River

The seven-page Memorandum of Understanding, signed this week at the Yukon Geoscience Forum, doesn’t mention the Peel specifically, but it does mention land use planning and respecting the process.

The deal follows in the wake of unprecedented mining activity in both the Mayo and Dawson regions. The two First Nations have said repeatedly they're not opposed to mining in the southern portion of their territories, but they do not want mining in the northern portion - the Peel watershed.

Promises made in the deal include:

to work together to leave a positive legacy for future generations and ensure that the essential characteristics and productive capacity of the land in Yukon remains substantially unchanged
to respect land use planning processes and work to ensure that social, cultural, economic and environmental policies are applied to the management, protection and use of land, water and resources in an integrated and co-ordinated manner so as to ensure sustainable development
to support each other in protecting and advancing their respective rights and interests
to work collaboratively to identify issues arising from applicable legislation and regulatory processes, and where appropriate, recommend solutions
to encourage proactive and transparent consultation between Yukon First Nations and the mining industry, as soon as practicable after a miner decides to explore for minerals in the First Nations’ traditional territories
to do their best to encourage the application of this MOU to all mining activity in Yukon and all interaction between miners and Yukon First Nations, recognizing that the Chamber cannot bind its members, nor can the First Nations bind Yukon First Nations
to encourage increased partnerships between the mining industry and Yukon First Nation communities and businesses, investigate and increase investment potential, establish and foster procurement practices that benefit Yukon First Nations, and enhance human resources development and labour force development activities with Yukon First Nation communities and people
to encourage open and transparent communications and to develop a communications protocol between the Parties which embraces principles such as timely and frank exchange of information and a commitment to converse prior to contentious or difficult matters becoming public
to develop a dispute resolution process
to endeavour to develop and advocate a common position in respect of the resource royalty regime in Yukon

A steering committee, supported by a working group, will be set up to guide and implement the deal. It's promised to meet at least three times a year to identify priorities and finalize annual work plans.

In two years time, the parties will decide if they want to continue with the agreement or whether it needs changes. The deal can be terminated at any time by either side.

The Paz on the Peel: post election

2011-11-09T11:51:00.000-08:00

Now safely ensconced in the powerful corner office, Yukon Premier Darrell Pasloski says cutting a deal on the Peel is one his new government's top priorities.

Here's what he said during a CBC-TV interview this week:

"Well what we’re going to do is we’re going to finish the process that was agreed upon with the four First Nations and the Yukon government. There’s still a bit of consultation work to be done. And then, as I had said, it’s really about bringing all the players back to the table so that we can come up with something that works.

"That's really what Yukoners want. There’s been a lot of polarization, a lot of division happening and really sort of this whole atmosphere of picking winners and losers.

"And we believe, as happened in the North Yukon land use plan, when they couldn’t get it done at first, that they took a step back and came back to the table and they were able to come up with something that worked for everybody and that’s our goal....

"I can’t give you a set date yet. This is a priority for us....We’re going to move forward with this and it’s going to be something that needs to be dealt with in the very near future."

His comments raise a number of troubling questions.

1. Has Pasloski already dismissed the results of the upcoming consultations before they are even held?

2. Is he going to reject the plan no matter what the public says or wants? Is the government about to make a mockery of the consultation process?

3. As for getting "the players" around the table behind closed doors, is that even legal? The Umbrella Final Agreement's land use planning chapter makes no mention of private deals. And even if it did, who would Pasloski invite? Who would accept? And what would he do if said "players" could not agree as would be the case?

4. Why does he mention the early failures of the North Yukon plan? Is he raising the spectre that the government is preparing to pull the plug on the Peel plan despite the fact it's mere pen-strokes from completion? Even though six plus years and more than $1 million worth of research, analysis, consultation and plain old hard work have gone into its making?

5. Finally, what happened to Pasloski's Yukon Party that had so much respect for the Peel planning process that it didn't want to tell voters it hated the plan for fear it would taint the consultations?

Let the political games begin

2011-11-07T10:44:00.000-08:00

Yukon Party captain Darrell Pasloski named his starting lineup: an eight-member cabinet of four veterans and four rookies, with three left on the sidelines as potential referees.

Former party rebel Brad Cathers has finally been rewarded for standing up to his old boss, Dennis Fentie. Cathers gets his old job back – the powerful post of energy, mines and resources minister. That’s the department in charge of land use planning and also the department which worked overtime to scuttle Peel protection.

Perhaps both the department and the Peel will benefit from the respect for truth and democracy Cathers has shown in the past. Whether he'll have the jam to accept the Peel plan - six long years in the making - is the million dollar question.

Elaine Taylor, the lone woman invited to sit in cabinet, has been shuffled to community services from tourism where, in her nine years as minister, she never once publically defended the Peel and isn't likely to start.

Her replacement likely won't either. Newcomer Mike Nixon, the son-in-law of Conservative Senator Dan Lang, hid behind the planning process when he first ran in the Whitehorse Centre byelection last December.

Now Nixon's in charge of not only tourism but also justice. Interesting combo. Especially since some pundits predict the Peel plan will go directly to court if the Yukon government rejects it.

Twenty-six-year-old Currie Dixon, who took out Liberal leader Arthur Mitchell in Copperbelt North, is the new minister of economic development and environment. In that order.

Fresh out of university with a master's in political science, he may soon realize they're the same thing - the environment and the economy - but given his inexperience he's not likely to carry much weight in cabinet.

Still he'll have more credibility than former Liberal cabinet minister Scott Kent, who recently switched political horses, then led the anti-Pasloski-for-leader campaign and now sits as education minister. The former executive director of the Yukon Chamber of Mines has been a vocal opponent of Peel protection and that's not likely to change.

Rounding out the field is former Whitehorse councilor, Doug Graham, who also jumped from the Liberals to the Yukon Party at the 11th hour. He's now the minister of health and social services while Wade Istchenko – who just days ago confessed to falsifying his wilderness tourism licence application – is in charge of highways and public works.

Like his predecessor, Pasloski will oversee finance and the executive council office.

Of the three remaining Yukon Party MLAs - Porter Creek Centre’s David Laxton, Pelly-Nisutlin’s Stacey Hassard and Watson Lake’s Patti McLeod – one will become the speaker and another will chair the committee of the whole.

Pasloski recently told the business community his new "team" will get to play its first legislative game sometime before Christmas but he hasn't released any dates to the public yet.

Tombstone mining plan still too hazy: YESAB

2011-11-03T09:54:00.000-07:00

More information is needed before assessors can review a second application to mine for gold in the middle of the Yukon’s Tombstone Territorial Park.

“We have reviewed your supplementary information submission dated Oct. 14, 2011 and have determined that additional information is required in order to consider the proposal adequate and commence the evaluation,” says an Oct. 25 letter from the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board to Canadian United Minerals.

This is the second request for more details since the company submitted a new application to work it controversial Horn claims in the Peel's upper Blackstone River region.

Its first attempt to renew its five-year mining land use permit in 2010 sparked a huge public outcry.

That proposal was eventually rejected because of its impact on wildlife and park visitors. It included a winter trail along the Blackstone to the Dempster to haul out the ore by snow machine.

The winter trail is no longer part of the 2011 application. Instead, the company says it would only use helicopters in both winter and summer. It would fly directly from Dawson City or from a staging area on the Dempster Highway - possibly the gravel pit at Kilometre 66 which serves as the trailhead for Grizzly Valley hikers.

As for the claims, it plans to dig more trenches (8M X 4M X 2M) with a backhoe, use dynamite to blast rock and house between two to eight workers at its camp.

YESAB's latest list of questions includes concerns about the disturbance of sheep. This was an issue during the first review and the board wants to know how this new plan is any different.

It's asked for more information on how the company plans to reduce its impact on the local hunting company and other park visitors.

“Your response to question 1d [about potential impact on park visitors] is insufficient as it argues preferential rights rather than demonstrating how the project proposal considers minimizing, controlling or eliminating significant adverse effects associated with helicopter access in particular,” says the YESAB letter.

The board also wants to know where the company plans to burn its garbage. And it's asked for more detail on the potential of metal leaching and acid rock drainage.

Although Canadian United Minerals says it’s cleaned up its old mess on the claims, as required under its previous permit, the board wants to see the reports and photographs of the work done.

“The information is relevant to this assessment because it will provide a better understanding of the current state of environmental conditions as well as aid in determining future (potential) project effects,” YESAB says.

All of the YESAB documents for the Horn Quartz Exploration - Tombstone Application #2011-0134 can be viewed the board's website http://www.yesab.ca/.

The aftermath of the Yukon election

2011-10-17T11:27:00.000-07:00

The dust has settled and it’s not pretty. Especially for the Peel.

Although the Yukon Party only garnered 40% of the vote, it has walked away with its third majority, thanks to vote-splitting between the NDP and Liberals.

But it wasn’t exactly a resounding victory.

The right-wing regime went into the election holding 11 of the territory’s 18 seats. It came out 31 days later with 11 of 19 seats and minus three cabinet ministers - Glenn Hart, Steve Nordick and Marian Horne.

Voters closest to the Peel watershed wanted nothing to do with Darrell Pasloski and his Yukon Party.

Residents of Mayo-Tatchun picked NDP Jim Tredger to go the legislature, the Vuntut Gwitchin returned Liberal Darius Elias, and Klondike voters turfed Economic Development Minister Steve Nordick, opting instead for Liberal school teacher Sandy Silver.

Protection of the Peel was a major issue. Mostly the public wanted to know if the parties would support the final recommended land use plan – a plan that’s been six years in the making and protects 80% of the watershed from industrial development.

Only the Yukon Party refused to commit to it.

First Pasloski said he couldn’t share his party’s position on the Peel because of an agreement signed with the Na-cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Vuntut Gwitchin and Gwich’in Tribal Council.

But those four First Nation leaders - who all support the plan - were quick to dispell that excuse.

“This is false,” they said in a full-page ad, chastising Pasloski for misleading the public and spelling out just what those agreements do say.

They also took exception to comments he made that they were irresponsible for going public with their Peel positions.

Taking a new tack, the Yukon Party then turned its guns on the potential cost of protecting the Peel. Compensating claim-holders could run into the millions, meaning Yukoners would go without other things, Pasloski said.

"The recent assertion by Premier Pasloski that implementing the plan would bankrupt the Yukon is misguided, verging on fear-mongering,” said the chiefs.

“The plan doesn’t call for expropriation of mining claims. It is also interesting to note that the Yukon Party government allowed the number of mining claims in the Peel to quintuple during the planning process.”

The final round of public consultations for the Peel land use plan are expected to begin within the next couple of months.

Once the new government is in place, one of its first orders of business should be to extend the current staking moratorium - due to expire in early February - for at least another year until the plan is finalized.

Related reading:
The Peel is not Windy Craggy (Yukon News, Oct. 7, 2011)
Parties pronouce promises on Peel, platform (Whitehorse Star, Oct. 6, 2011)
Pasloski pounded over Peel (Yukon News, Sept. 23, 2011)
ATIPP shows Yukon Party government ignored Peel public input
Environment ATIPP records on Peel consultation (Oct. 3, 2011)

All-party forum to target environment

2011-09-21T20:08:00.000-07:00

A Yukon election forum focused on environmental issues, such as the future of the Peel watershed, will be held Sept. 27 in Whitehorse.

CPAWS-Yukon, the Yukon Conservation Society, Friends of McIntyre Creek, the Wilderness Tourism Association of the Yukon and Raven Recycling have invited candidates from all political parties to attend.

The environment is an important issue in this election, said Karen Baltgailis, YCS executive director, in a news release.

Although Yukoners are getting benefits from the mining boom, they also have concerns about the environmental impacts, she said.

“All this new mining is opening a Pandora’s box of issues," said Baltgailis. "Where will the power come from? What are the impacts on wildlife and water? Will the Yukon still be the place we love when the dust settles and the mines go away?”

CPAWS-Yukon executive director Mike Dehn said Yukon Party leader Darrell Pasloski had said he didn't want the Peel watershed to be an issue but it is whether he wants it to be or not.

“I’m sure people will be very interested in trying to get an answer about where all of the parties stand on the Peel,” he said.

Big, wild places like the Peel are also essential to the wilderness tourism industry. It wants to know how the parties plan to maintain a diversified economy and provide a strong foundation for tourism.

Another issue is the protection of Middle McIntyre Creek from housing and road development.

Raven Recycling executive director Joy Snyder expects the public will want to know how the next government will increase waste diversion rates. They have remained at 11% for the past five years.

She thinks there will also be questions about Yukon Energy's idea of burning garbage to create power.

The two-hour forum is at the High Country Inn beginning at 7 p.m.

Yukon News tries to pin down Pasloski on Peel

2011-09-19T06:39:00.000-07:00

Yukon News reporter John Thompson interviewed Yukon Party Darrell Pasloski about the Peel. The following is his Sept. 16 story.

When Darrell Pasloski campaigned to become the Yukon Party’s leader this spring, he cautioned his party faithful to not let the fate of the Peel Watershed become an election issue.

Too late. The Liberals, NDP and Greens have all promised to act on a plan to protect four-fifths of the vast swath of northeast Yukon that’s twice the size of Vancouver Island.

Four affected First Nations have also thrown their support behind the final plan. And they want Pasloski to make his position clear.

But Pasloski insists that, by doing so, the chiefs are breaking a deal.

“You have to be responsible,” he told the Yukon News Friday morning during a sit-down interview. “You have to follow agreements that you sign.”

But which agreement? Pasloski’s predecessor, Dennis Fentie, often hid behind a copy of the Umbrella Final Agreement to dodge questions on the Peel, to justify what many people saw as his meddling in the process.

But Pasloski isn’t talking about the UFA. He’s referring to a joint letter of understanding, signed by the territory and First Nations in January.

It sets the rules for how to behave during the final steps of the planning process, with the aim of having a plan signed by all parties in early November.

What’s far from clear is why Pasloski asserts this letter prevents him from speaking his mind on the Peel Watershed.

So, with the four-page agreement splayed before Pasloski, the News asked him to identify the section that forbids him from taking a public position on the Peel.

He wouldn’t.

So we asked again. And again.

In all, Pasloski was asked six times in 15 minutes.

He never did cite a particular section. Instead, Pasloski stuck to generalities.

Afterwards, this reporter gave the letter one more thorough read and couldn’t find any part that would prevent Pasloski from speaking to the matter.

But Pasloski insists doing so would be wrong, because it would mean he had prejudged a process that hasn’t wrapped up.

A timeline agreed to in January includes one more final round of public consultations. Meetings were slated from mid-August to mid-September, in Whitehorse, Mayo, Old Crow, Dawson City and Fort McPherson. But they never happened.

And, with an election underway, these talks won’t start until a new government is in place.

Consultations were delayed so that miners, who are busy hunting for shiny metal in the summer, could attend, said Pasloski.

But didn’t his government help set the timetable it’s no longer meeting? To this, Pasloski passes the blame to the Peel planners.

They completed their final plan nearly a month late, he said.

It’s a puzzling point to make, because even if the talks were held a month earlier than scheduled, this would be an equally inconvenient time for miners.

The Yukon government has already conducted one round of public talks on the Peel, in the summer of 2010. It never released the results.

But when conservationists hired DataPath Systems to determine the outcome of the consultations, it concluded that the vast majority of respondents wanted most of the watershed protected.

Pasloski offered a comparison to explain his position, or lack thereof.

The territory recently extended public consultations for its revamped wolf management plan. It would be premature for the territory to state it’s position on that now, before everyone has had a chance to speak.

So it goes with the Peel, he said.

“It would be like the government coming out and saying, ‘This is what we’re going to do,’ today, without finishing the consultation process. As a government, we need to be responsible. And I think that’s what people want to see.”

But Pasloski isn’t just refusing to say what his government will do with the Peel plan. He’s refusing to offer any specific criticism of the proposal.

It’s clear the Yukon Party thinks the plan goes too far and doesn’t allow enough mining. But the only people to say so out loud are candidates that drifted away from the Liberals to recently join the Yukon Party: Scott Kent and David Laxton.

It would be “irresponsible” to make any comment about the final Peel plan at this point, said Pasloski.

The Yukon Party would protect part of the Peel, said Pasloski. But he won’t say how much.

“I won’t put a number on it,” he said.

“I think that’s not responsible, for people to come out and make a final decision before all the information is out.”

Contact John Thompson at johnt@yukon-news.com

Chiefs call on Pasloski to come clean on Peel

2011-09-13T06:51:00.000-07:00

This is an open letter to Yukon Premier Darrell Pasloski from the Peel's four First Nations.

Dear Mr. Premier,

We are writing an open letter to ask you to clearly articulate the Yukon Party government’s position on the recommended Peel Watershed Land Use Plan.

Please set out your position in writing as soon as possible prior to the election.

We have been clear in stating the support of our governments for the recommended plan. The Peel watershed has unparalleled natural and cultural values which need to be protected.

We have publicly stated that we are prepared to compromise and support the final recommendation.

Affected First Nations and the Yukon public deserve to know your position in order to make informed choices when we go to the polls. We are calling upon you to clarify your position.

Thank you for your timely response.

Chief Eddie Taylor
Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in, Dawson City

Chief Simon Mervyn
First Nation of Na-Cho Nyak Dun, Mayo

Richard Nerysoo, President
Gwich’in Tribal Council

Norma Kassi, Chief
Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation, Old Crow

And the Yukon election race is on...

2011-09-09T15:06:00.000-07:00

Sandwiched between stories of tumbling stock markets, 9/11 memorials, rising unemployment numbers and the first-ever Whitehorse "slutwalk" came news that Yukon voters will go to the polls Oct. 11.

Just as former Yukon Party premier Dennis Fentie did almost five years ago to the day, his replacement, Darrell Pasloski, used a chamber of commerce luncheon as the backdrop for the announcement.

If there were any awkward moments - Pasloski just fired Whitehorse Chamber of Commerce chair Gerrard Fleming as the party's candidate for Mount Lorne-Southern Lakes earlier this week - nobody mentioned it. (Fleming told the Yukon News it was because of an old wrongful dismissal case.)

The right-wing Yukon Party is gunning for a third term in power, but Pasloski has no political experience and must win a seat himself if he wants to keep his new job.

Given the government's general unpopularity and poor track record of managing money and the environment, many believe it's time for a change.

A recent poll suggests a tight two-way race between the ruling party and the NDP. The Yukon Party finished a distant third in last December's Whitehorse by-election. No party has ever won a territorial election three times running.

Protection of the Peel watershed will be one of the defining issues of the campaign.

The Yukon Party government has always bucked conservation in the watershed. Although officially saying it respects the planning process, it's ignored deadlines, interfered with departmental submissions and completely dismissed not only the commission's work but public support for large-scale protection.

Both the NDP and the Liberals promise to accept the plan for 80% protection if they win the election.

Changes to the electoral boundaries have added one more riding since 2006, making a total of 19. Ten seats would be needed for a majority. More than half of the ridings are now in Whitehorse where the bulk of the territory's 35,000 people live.

Related stories:
Will Yukon Party accept Peel plan - yes or no?
(Peel Watershed News, Aug. 31, 2011)
Poll points to tight Yukon Party-NDP race
(Peel Watershed News, Aug. 10, 2011)

Yukoners strongly support ATV regs: poll

2011-09-09T09:22:00.000-07:00

The Hart River trail is popular with ATV drivers.

Ninety-three per cent of Yukoners believe it's time to regulate the use of off-road vehicles to protect the backcountry, a new poll shows.

Commissioned by the Trails Only Yukon Association and conducted by Datapath Systems, the poll results were released this week to put the issue before political hopefuls in the territorial election.

Only seven per cent of those polled opposed controls on ATV use.

The Trails Only group was formed in 2010 to highlight the damage off-road vehicles are doing to the environment and to push the government into doing something about it.

As a result, an all-party committee studied the issue and came up with 14 recommendations, including the need for ATV regulation.

The recently-released final recommended Peel watershed land use plan also tackled the contentious issue.

It came up with two recommendations for off-road vehicle use in the region:

To prevent impacts on wildlife, soil damage and land-user conflicts, the use of wheeled off-road vehicles (quads, motorbikes and Argos-like vehicles) for any purpose should be restricted to the Hart River Trail, existing trails in areas immediately adjacent to the Dempster Highway, licensed camps, and existing facilities.
In areas of allowed use, off-road vehicle use should not occur in sensitive habitats. In this plan, sensitive habitats are defined as wetlands and alpine areas in the spring, summer and fall seasons.

Read related story:
"They're leaving behind scars that last a lifetime"
(Whitehorse Star, Sept. 8, 2011)

Click here for CBC Yukon interview with the Trails Only group (Sept. 9, 2011)

Will Yukon Party accept Peel plan - yes or no?

2011-08-31T20:52:00.000-07:00

Yukon Premier Darrell Pasloski

If the Yukon Party wins the next election, will it accept the final recommended Peel land use plan?

Yes or no.

Simple question. Simple answer.

But not for Yukon Premier Darrell Pasloski. He can’t answer it or at least he won’t.

“I’m not going to give you a yes or no answer,” Pasloski said when asked at a public meeting Wednesday in Mount Lorne, the last pit-stop on his pre-election community tour.

Groping for words to explain his refusal, he didn’t have to dig too deeply into the Yukon Party’s bag of political obfuscations to find the same old, tired phrases it’s been hiding behind for the past few years.

There are “many factors” to be considered when it comes to the Peel plan, said the newly-minted, but as yet unelected, premier.

And there’s “the process” for land use planning laid out in the Yukon land claim. And the agreement his government signed with the four First Nations in January about the work ahead and the timelines.

And don't forget "balance" and not wanting to "throw a number out" because that gets too political.

Besides, he said, this public meeting - a meeting supposedly set up so he could listen to the concerns of Yukoners - was "not the forum" to talk about the Peel.

Officially his government says it needs time to study the final recommended plan. Released in late July by the planning commission, it calls for 80% of the watershed to be protected from industrial development.

Unofficially, his government has done everything within its power, and then some, to thwart any meaningful protection in the watershed.

Although the final round of public consultation was supposed to get underway by mid-August, that deadline has come and gone as if it had never been agreed to. Now all bets are on November at the earliest.

That means the election Pasloski is expected to call next week for Oct. 11 will have conveniently come and gone by the time attention is focused on the Peel.

But that's not going to stop voters from asking. And that's not going to stop voters from expecting a straight and honest response.

Will your party accept the Peel plan if it forms the next Yukon government?

Yes or no.

Easy question. Easy answer.

Toronto Star puts Peel in the spotlight

2011-08-22T20:09:00.000-07:00

The craggy spine of the Great Divide is all that protects the Peel wilderness from the current mineral exploration frenzy.

Toronto Star columnist Paul Watson recently visited the Peel watershed, spending several days at Bonnet Plume Lake.

That's just a little north of one of the biggest mineral exploration plays in the Yukon this year.

Although the Peel is currently off-limits to new mineral claim staking, Watson notes the exploration companies are working right up to the watershed's boundary, and undoubtedly would push beyond if it were allowed.

Here are the links to his two excellent stories:
A majestic Yukon where humans are still outsiders
(Aug. 19, 2011 Toronto Star)
As industry encroaches, Yukoners make last stand to preserve unspoiled wilderness
(Aug. 20, 2011 Toronto Star)

Real wealth is in the natural world

2011-08-11T11:48:00.000-07:00

This is a commentary by Jim Taggart, Yukon Conservation Society:

Can the economic value of the environment be quantified?

Water wealth in the Snake River valley.

Nature is worth tens of billions of pounds a year in economic benefits and societal well-being in the United Kingdom, according to the first extensive financial assessment of a nation’s environment.

Commissioned by the UK government, the National Ecosystem Assessment report provides a new way of estimating national wealth and represents the first time any country in the world has quantified the economic, health and social benefits of its ecosystems in monetary terms.

In essence, the UK NEA audit calculated the value that UK habitats add to the economy each year through natural-world support for the basic infrastructure of life, provision of renewable resources, removing pollution, providing cultural benefits and offering recreational spaces.

It asserts that we’ve constantly failed to consider the economic benefits that a thriving environment brings and, contrary to the traditional view that economic growth is based on chasing a higher Gross Domestic Product, the report implies we will end up richer and happier if we take into account the true value of nature.

Of course, this isn’t the first time attempts have been made to place economic values on the environment.

The Canadian Boreal Initiative's study, The Real Wealth of the Mackenzie Region, compiled a natural capital balance sheet of the state of Canada’s Mackenzie watershed Boreal region in response to pressures for a natural gas pipeline in the region.

The market value of the Mackenzie watershed, assessed as the region’s GDP, was estimated at $41.9 billion per year, while non-market values, assessed as the potential value of 17 "ecosystem services" produced by the region, was estimated at $570.6 billion per year.

In addition, the carbon stored by forests, wetlands and tundra were valued at an estimated $339 billion.

These figures are far in excess of the potential, and short-term, economic benefits of a natural gas pipeline. Current industrial activity in the region (with a footprint of 25.6 million hectares) results in an estimated cost of natural capital degradation in the billions of dollars. The development of a pipeline would further erode this natural wealth.

This new approach does not suggest that natural capital extraction should cease or never take place, but rather that there be a more prudent consideration of future natural capital stewardship, so that valuable ecosystem services can be maintained while meeting human needs and economic development objectives.

In its excellent report on economics and the Peel watershed, CPAWS identified the economic value of the region in terms of the income accrued through tourism, conservation and the provision of visitor services.

This figure runs into the tens of millions of dollars, even over a relatively short 10-year period. Quite impressive, until you consider the ‘natural capital’ approach. Acknowledging the region’s "infrastructure" support for the basis necessities of human life and resource provision increases the value of the Peel watershed to tens of billions of dollars. This surely surpasses any direct economic benefits from industrial development.

We know it makes environmental sense. Now it makes economic sense too.

Poll points to tight Yukon Party-NDP race

2011-08-10T10:18:00.000-07:00

Environment key to winning hearts of Yukon voters.

The upcoming Yukon election looks like it's going to be a two-way race between the ruling right-wing Yukon Party and the New Democrats, results from a new DataPath Systems poll show.

Forty per cent of 424 Yukoners polled in late July said they support the Yukon Party while 35% favoured the NDP. Only 15% chose the Liberals. The fledgling Greens garnered 7%.

The Yukon Party has picked up steam since switching leaders, but satisfaction with the party remains tentative and “could still be influenced with the amount of time remaining before the election,” said pollster Donna Larsen in a news release.

Support for the NDP has also grown steadily since it elected leader Liz Hanson. She easily won the Whitehorse Centre by-election last December, with the Yukon Party coming a distant third.

Both parties have stolen support from the Liberals which, this time last year, led the poll at 39%.

So which party has the best chance to win the upcoming election?

“It will all come down to the riding candidates, as 60% of voters also reported that they are not 100% sure about who they will vote for at this time,” said Larsen in the release.

Although the environment remains among the top voter issues, it's recently dropped to second place in the wake of the growing housing crisis. The economy now ranks fourth.

Demographically, the poll shows Yukon Party supporters tend to be men over 50 who work in the private sector while government workers, females and people under 35 are more attracted to the NDP.

Click here to read today's National Post story on the Yukon election.

             July/11   April/11 July/10
YP          40%          32%            22%
NDP       35%          31%            26%
LIB         15%          25%            39%

Northern Mountain caribou draft plan released

2011-08-08T11:27:00.000-07:00

It’s three years late, but the proposed management plan for the Northern Mountain woodland caribou paints a pretty clear picture.

The roughly 45,000 caribou that roam the mountains and valleys of the Yukon, western N.W.T. and northern B.C. face mounting pressures and an uncertain future.

"The goal of the management plan is to prevent the Northern Mountain population from becoming threatened or endangered, by having responsible agencies co-operatively work together to carefully manage these caribou and their habitat," says the 89-page document recently released by Environment Canada for public comment.

Northern Mountain caribou were put on Canada's species at risk list in 2005 as a species of "special concern" and planning process began.

Six years later, planners still lack basic information on many of the 36 herds.

Population trends for 22 of the herds is "unknown," says the plan. Seven are considered stable, four are increasing and three decreasing.

And aside from Nahanni National Park, almost none of the Northern Mountain caribou's range has any special protection even though their survival depends on healthy habitat.

Plenty of work needs to be done to better manage these caribou, says the plan, and governments should get to work soon.

Among the plan's recommendations:

determine herd status and trends over time
manage harvest for sustainable use
assess health risks and maintain caribou health
increase understanding of the dynamics of predator-prey systems andpotential competition with other herbivores
identify and assess the quality, quantity and distribution of important habitats for the population
manage and conserve important habitats to support caribou herds.
promote conservation of the Northern Mountain herds through environmental and cumulative effects assessments
foster opportunities to share knowledge and information and developeducation and stewardship programs

The Peel watershed is home to two Northern Mountain herds.

The transboundary Bonnet Plume herd, which also spends time in the N.W.T., has only been counted once. But that was 30 years ago and confidence in the results - 5,000 animals - is low, says the plan.

"A census has not been conducted on this herd but biologists believe that it may be one of the largest within the Northern Mountain population,” it says. "Mineral exploration has taken place within the Yukon portion of the herd’s range near mapped key habitats."

The Hart River herd had 2,113 caribou when it was counted in 2006. It faces more hunting pressure because its range includes the Dempster Highway area where the larger and more liberally-hunted Porcupine caribou, a barrenground herd, also winters.

“Ingress from the Porcupine caribou herd needs to be determined and annual adjustment of hunting seasons based on monitoring of collared animals needs to be continued. Recreational activities have increased in the last few years and there is potential for industrial development.”

Click here to read the proposed Northern Mountain caribou management plan on the Species At Risk Act online registry.

The deadline for public comments is Sept. 23.

Related story:
Northern Mountain caribou plan in slowcooker
(Peel Watershed News, Dec. 16, 2010)

Protect the Peel, says David Suzuki

2011-08-06T11:09:00.000-07:00

Protecting the world's last remaining wilderness areas may be the only hope for the planet's survival, renowned Canadian scientist David Suzuki told Yukoners before setting off to paddle the Peel's Hart River.

But in order to do that, a fundamental shift in the way we view the environment's place in the economy is needed, Suzuki said.

“So long as the Yukon government or the B.C. government or the Canadian government thinks the economy is the highest priority and everything else must be subordinate to that, we’re hooped," he said.

"It's just wrong. It's destructive. We are animals. And as animals if we don't have clean air, clean water, clean soil, we're hooped."

Instead, governments need to create economies that put the priority on protecting the life-support systems upon which we all depend, he said.

Setting aside huge swaths of pristine wilderness is paramount, he said.

"As a hedge against our ignorance, this is what we need - large intact areas. And to me the Peel represents that," he said.

Although he wished the final land use plan had recommended protection of 100% of the watershed, he commended the commission for at least having the foresight to protect 80%.

Related stories:
Leave remaining nature intact, scientist urges (Whitehorse Star Aug. 1)
Wilderness should be sacrosanct (Yukon News, Aug. 1)
Environmentalist prefers 100% protection for Peel basin (CBC Yukon, Aug. 1)

Tr'ondek Hwech'in, Na-cho Nyak Dun prepared to live with 80% Peel protection compromise

2011-07-28T12:25:00.000-07:00

The Tr'ondek Hwech'in and Na-cho Nyak Dun say they can support the new Peel plan even though it falls short of their expectations.

They issued the following news release this week:

The Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in and Na-Cho Nyak Dun want to acknowledge the hard work and dedication of the Peel Planning Commission in bringing forward a final recommended Peel River Watershed Land Use Plan.

This has not been an easy task. But the Commission honoured the principles in our Agreements, listened to the people in Yukon, and in the end brought forward a balanced recommendation for the Parties’ consideration. Thanks for your perseverance.

As we previously stated, we believe that 100% of the watershed deserves protection. This area has unparalleled natural and cultural values for our peoples. And unlike most of the Yukon, the lands and waters in this ecosystem are still pristine. If push comes to shove, we are prepared to defend this position.

But this is not the time for entrenched positions and political grandstanding. As an avenue to find consensus with the government of Yukon we are prepared to support this recommendation. We would like to see the mining industry support this consensus as well.

We believe this recommendation provides all of the diverse interests in Yukon the opportunity to close ranks in the public interest.

“It’s time to set aside our differences and work together,” said Na-Cho Nyak Dun Chief Simon Mervyn. “We’re willing to support the final recommendation in order to protect the core values of the Peel.”

Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in Chief Eddie Taylor reflected, “We hoped for more protection, but are prepared to support this recommendation if the other Parties do the same. We look forward to engaging with the public and the government of Yukon to complete this process.”

NDP & Liberals support new Peel plan

2011-07-28T11:41:00.000-07:00

The new Peel land use plan has the backing of both the Yukon NDP and the Yukon Liberals.

The recently-released plan recommends protecting 80% from industrial development while allowing the resource industry to work in the other 20%.

Based on the best available scientific analysis available, this plan also reflects the wishes of a majority of Yukoners and the four affected First Nations, said NDP leader Liz Hanson in a news release.

“The commission has listened to the people of the Yukon and produced a plan that provides a blueprint for the protection of this unique and important ecosystem,” she said.

“The plan also recommends a precautionary approach to future development that would ensure maximum socio-economic benefit and minimize potential environmental harm. It is a principled and practical way forward.”

The Yukon Party government has shown nothing but contempt for the planning process, Hanson said. First it refused to ban mineral staking while planning was underway and then it forced its environment department to water down its submission.

“Yukoners are rightly suspect of the current government’s commitment to environmental conservation and responsible resource exploitation,” said Hanson.

The Yukon Liberal Party also says it remains committed to protecting the Peel watershed.

The final recommended plan is a solid blueprint to achieve that goal, says leader Arthur Mitchell in a news release.

“We have been on the public record for some time now with our support for protecting a significant area of the Peel watershed,” said Mitchell.

“The final report is principle based and was reached after an exhaustive examination of each management area within the watershed and extensive public consultation so we can definitely support its findings.”

Now it’s time for the Premier Darrell Pasloski to tell the public where the Yukon Party government stands.

“The new boss is the same as the old boss - both Premiers’ [Dennis] Fentie and Pasloski have refused to say how much of the Peel they think should be protected and how much should be open to development,” said Mitchell.

“We know Mr. Fentie was working behind the scenes to tilt the plan against protection and so far the new premier has refused to clearly state where he stands on the issue.”

With a territorial election on the horizon the Yukon Party government owes it to the public to be open and accountable about how it would proceed in the Peel, he said.

“It’s obvious from its actions the Yukon Party government doesn’t agree with the broad strokes of the commission’s work,” he said.

“It’s time for the new premier to quit ducking the issue and tell Yukoners what he does support in terms of land set aside. His commitment to run a more open government than Mr. Fentie is on the line here.”

Conservation groups support compromise Peel plan, urge gov't and industry to do the same

2011-07-27T14:02:00.000-07:00

CPAWS-Yukon and the Yukon Conservation Society say the final recommended Peel plan isn't all they hoped for but it will do.

“It is a tough compromise, but one that we can live with,” says CPAWS-Yukon executive director Mike Dehn in a news release.

“The Peel is a national treasure and we are willing to accept industrial access in some of the watershed in exchange for protecting 80% of the watershed. This plan honours the overwhelming support by First Nations and the Yukon public for Peel protection while leaving some of the watershed open to paced industrial development.”

To date the Yukon government has ignored vast public support for protection, opting instead to back industrial special interests that want mines and roads in the Peel, says the release.

In response, the planning commission has now eased restrictions on industrial access to some parts of the watershed, but held firm on sustaining the watershed's globally significant wilderness values.

The Yukon's mining industry has been booming for the past two years despite a staking ban in the Peel, the two groups point out.

“Mining investors have shown that protecting the Peel will have no impact on their investment decisions," says Dehn. "We can protect the world class Peel wilderness watershed and the mining boom and the jobs it brings will continue unaffected.”

Now it's time for the Yukon government to support the plan, says Karen Baltgailis, of the Yukon Conservation Society.

“YTG worked very hard to defend the special interests of the mining and oil and gas sectors in the Peel, and the planning commission weighed those demands against the broad public and First Nations support for more protection," says Baltgailis.

"No one got everything they wanted, but we can accept the trade-offs this plan represents. In this election year, we urge the Yukon government to do the same. Yukon voters will have the final word on this.”

The two groups expect "responsible resource firms" to respect First Nations and the Yukon public by withdrawing their interests in the 80% of the watershed slated for protection.

“Responsible companies listen to the voices of local people and First Nations and respect public processes. It's time for the good guys in the mining and energy sectors to show some leadership in the Peel,” says Baltgailis.

Click here to listen to a July 27 CBC Yukon radio interview with Mike Dehn.

Protection still key in new Peel plan

2011-07-26T13:14:00.000-07:00

At first blush, the recently-released final recommended Peel land use plan seems quite similar to its predecessor.

Eighty per cent of the region is still slated for protection while 20 per cent is open for industrial development.

The “conservation area” covers most of the southern watershed, including the Wind, Snake, Bonnet Plume and Hart Rivers. It’s split into two categories – 55% would be permanently protected while the other 25% would receive interim protection but be subject to future review.

Despite the protection designation, work on more than 8,000 existing minerals claims would still be allowed to continue in the "conservation area." However no new claims could be staked, no new roads built and the Wind River Trail would be off limits for industrial purposes.

The 20% of the watershed designated for development, called “integrated management zones,” are in the Dempster Highway and Peel Plateau areas. Unlike the earlier plan, new roads would be allowed in these zones but would be temporary and not for public use.

Sustainable development is the cornerstone of this final plan, says the six-member planning commission in its introductory message.

Established six years ago to come up with a blueprint for the Peel, the commission says it determined early on it wanted to maintain the unique region's wilderness characteristics, its wildlife and their habitats, its cultural resources and its waters.

“It is fundamentally important to preserve these qualities in the Peel watershed,” it writes. “We did not make this up; we did not insert these values into our process. We heard it clearly from people experienced in the Peel watershed; we heard it clearly from the affected First Nations; we heard it from nearby communities; and we heard it from Yukon people in general.”

The amount of land protected and surface access are the two most contentious issues. First Nations and many others called for 100% protection and no roads. The Yukon government and the resource industry said 80% protection was too much and roads were a must.

“It was impossible for the commission to accept all of the responses to these topics, since collectively they contradicted each other,” it says. “We could not both increase and decrease the quantum of protected land. We could not both increase and decrease provisions for access."

In the end it rejected the government's push for less protection and more roads.

“The Yukon government’s response stated in general terms what it wanted, but it did not discuss why it wanted these changes and where it felt they might be appropriate," says the commission. "It did not discuss locations of concerns, or what modifications it sought....For the commission to adequately address this general critique, it would have to go back to the drawing board and return to a much earlier stage in the planning process - a step for which there was no provision.”

It goes on to say: "After much deliberation, the commission concluded that its rationale for protecting these areas was sound, in view of its determination to preserve society’s future options and the outstanding wilderness and cultural values documented in these landscapes. The commission also reconsidered its recommendations on surface access in view of industry’s rejection of full restoration of access roads and of the impacts access roads create in the Yukon under its current regulatory regime. Our decision was that since surface access is typically a permanent development, the responsible choice in the Peel region is to preserve options by denying new surface access across much of the area until society is clear on this highly controversial matter."

Its work now done, the commission urges the Yukon government and the four affected First Nations - Na-Cho Nyak Dun, Tron'dek Hwech'in, Vuntut Gwitchin and Gwich'in Tribal Council - to accept the final recommended plan.

"It is carefully considered and it achieves the goals set out for it in a way consistent with the spirit and intent of the Umbrella Final Agreement and upholds the principles of sustainable development. We emphasize again that this plan is not a template for future planning efforts in other regions of the Yukon. We believe that in the Peel, this plan is a responsible approach that enables Yukoners to serve as stewards of this extraordinary landscape.

"If this plan is accepted, future generations will salute our foresight."

Click here to read the final plan.

Read related stories:
Peel planners stick to their guns (Yukon News, July 27, 2011)
'You can't please everyone, you just can't' (Whitehorse Star July 26, 2011)
Peel watershed commission issues final report (CBC.ca July 26, 2011)

David Suzuki - On the Peel

2011-07-07T17:36:00.000-07:00

David Suzuki, the most trusted person in Canada, is adding his influential voice to the call to protect the wild Peel watershed.

Best known as the host of the CBC-TV series, The Nature of Things with David Suzuki, the outspoken environmentalist is also a respected scientist, educator and author.

Suzuki is coming to the Yukon from his B.C. home in late July for a family paddling trip in the Peel watershed.

But before that journey begins, he’s going to speak to Yukoners about why it’s important to protect the Peel.

Force of Nature: The David Suzuki Movie will also be shown. Billed as his last lecture: “a distillation of my life and thoughts, my legacy, what I want to say before I die,” it offers a blueprint for sustainability and survival.

Hosted by CPAWS-Yukon and the Yukon Conservation Society, the David Suzuki event is a fund-raiser for the never-ending battle to protect the Peel from industrial development.

There will also be a silent art auction for the limited edition Snake River Suite, a box set of six Peel-inspired fine art prints by Canadian artist Ron Bolt. He produced the work after paddling the river in 2003.

The Suzuki talk is at the Beringia Centre on Friday, July 29. It begins at 7 p.m. Tickets are available in advance.

Protection: Yukon 11.8% - Alaska 44%

2011-07-06T11:02:00.000-07:00

Only 11.8% of the Yukon wilderness is protected from industrial development.

That's not much. About 57,427 sq. km. of the territory's total land mass of 483,668 sq. km. to be exact.

Acre for acre it's about the same amount tied up by the mining and oil/gas industries. Both currently ring in at around 14 million acres (5.5 million hectares) and more 51-acre mineral claims are being staked daily.

Most of the territory's protected land - about 36,000 sq.km. - lies within the boundaries of Kluane, Ivvavik and Vuntut National Parks and the Nisutlin River Delta National Wildlife Area.

Add to that six smaller territorial parks. The iconic Tombstone Park on the Dempster Highway includes part of the Peel's upper Blackstone River. Also in the north are the Ni'iinlii Njik/Fishing Branch Park & Preserve and Herschel Island/Qikiqtaruk off the coast. The southern part of the territory hosts the Coal River Springs, Kusawa and Asi Keyi parks.

A seventh in the Tagish region, Agay Mene, is in the works but since it's still open to mineral claim staking it's not included in the government's protection numbers.

Four Habitat Protection Areas round out the Yukon's protection collection: Old Crow Flats, Horseshoe Slough on the Stewart River, Lhutsaw Wetlands, south of Pelly Crossing, and Tsawnjik Chu (Nordenskiold) Wetlands, near Carmacks, as well as half a dozen others in various planning stages.

Although the Yukon's 11.8% protection may sound respectable, it pales in comparison to its much larger neighbour, Alaska, which boasts a protection rate of 44%. That's nearly half the state. And it still has a healthy economy humming along with a mix of mining, tourism, oil/gas, fishing and forestry.

To the west, the vast Northwest Territories has already protected 10% and plans are underway to add another 13%, bringing its total to 23% and catapulting it into the country's top protection spot.

Right now British Columbia leads the land with 14.3%. Even environmental dinosaur Alberta currently outranks the Yukon with 12.5% of its land protected. Overall, 8.5% of Canada is protected with another 3.5% under consideration.

If even 80% of the Yukon's Peel watershed planning area of 68,000 sq. km. is protected as recommended, that'll add another 11.2% to its wilderness treasure chest, putting it on par with the N.W.T.

It'll also help improve the country's standings.

A recent report by Global Forest Watch says a country big and wild as Canada should be doing much more to conserve its wild places.

A non-profit organization called the Canadian Council on Ecological Areas documents the ever-changing status of protected land.

Its Conservation Areas Reporting and Tracking System, or CARTS, uses the International Union for Conservation of Nature's protected area definition: “A clearly defined geographical space, recognised, dedicated and managed, through legal or other effective means, to achieve the long-term conservation of nature with associated ecosystem services and cultural values.”

Click here to see the Yukon government's most current land status map.

Northern Cross cuts oil/gas deal with Chinese

2011-06-30T16:34:00.000-07:00

One of China's largest state-owned petroleum companies is getting in on the search for oil and gas in the northern Yukon, says Calgary-based Northern Cross in a June 30 news release.

Northern Cross holds oil and gas rights to more than a million acres in the Eagle Plain region. It acquired most of its 15 parcels in 2007 and promised to do about $20 million worth of work by August, 2013.

Now it's convinced the China National Offshore Oil Company, CNOOC, to put in some money.

“This investment will allow Northern Cross to fulfill work commitments under its current exploration permits located at Eagle Plain,” says the company's release.

“These work commitments are intended to further assess the oil and gas resource potential in the Eagle Plain area of northern Yukon. In addition to providing funding for early stage exploration and development, CNOOC Limited offers significant operational expertise that will be helpful to the successful execution of Northern Cross' business plan.”

It doesn't say when work will get underway or how much money CNOOC is investing.

Nor does it provide any insight into why a huge Chinese company, whose main focus is offshore gas development and LNG (liquefied natural gas) terminals, came to take an interest.

Coming or going? Oil/gas equipment languishes at an old camp beside the Dempster Highway, south of the Eagle Plains Lodge.

Most of the company's exploration parcels are in the Porcupine River drainage, but two of its most valued are in the Peel watershed, near the Dempster Highway.

Northern Cross promised to spend more than $5 million on Permit #14 and more than $3.5 million on Permit #15. Both surround Significant Discovery Licences handed out in the 1960s. (They have no expiry date and the government claims it can't release the name of the owners.)

Three years ago Northern Cross went through environmental reviews to get permits work the parcels both summer and winter and to build a camp. But not much has been done since.

Promotional material from the Yukon government says the Eagle Plain region is the territory's best hope for development, holding an estimated six trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 430 million barrels of oil.

In 2010 it commissioned a case study on getting that gas to market, specifically to power proposed new mines like Western Copper's Casino project and Selwyn Chihong's lead-zinc project on the Yukon/Northwest Territories border.

Earlier this year, the Vuntut Gwitchin, Tr'ondek Hwech'in and Na-cho Nyak Dun First Nations, along with the Gwich'in Tribal Council embarked on its feasibility study for transporting Eagle Plain gas.

The Eagle Plain region is also home to the Porcupine caribou herd. Although the latest count shows the herd is relatively healthy with 169,000 animals, it remains vulnerable to pressures from development, climate change and over-hunting.

The Paz and the Peel: a modest prescription

2011-06-23T07:34:00.000-07:00

A waterfall on the lower Wind River.

A new “prescription” for the Peel watershed will soon land on the desk of Yukon pharmacist-turned-premier Darrell Pasloski.

It’ll be heftier than the small slips of white paper the 50-year-old druggist is used to receiving.

But it’ll be easier to decipher than the usual pharmaceutical scrawl and the letterhead will be more aesthetically pleasing - the elegant green, blue and red logo of the Peel Watershed Planning Commission adding a little pizzazz to the drab black and white text.

The “patient” is in superb condition, save for a few contaminated sites and abandoned mining camps, according to the commission’s diagnosis to date.

But it's also extremely fragile and needs to be managed with care.

After spending more than five years poking and proding the Peel, the commission has concluded that such a vast and ecologically-endowed watershed is a rare global treasure worthy of preservation.

There aren’t many 16.8 million-acre intact wilderness regions remaining and, as the commission pointed out, the planet's not making any more of them.

Its prognosis: the Peel’s a prime candidate for eternal health and happiness if decision-makers follow the “doctor’s orders.”

If.

As the commission puts the finishing touches on the Peel’s final land use “prescription,” workers in Pasloski’s new dispensary are already scurrying around, dreaming up ways to delay processing it. At least until after the territorial election.

But all orders eventually need to be filled.

A customer can only be expected to saunter up and down the aisles for so long, examining crap they’d never buy and playing with the take-your-own-blood-pressure machine.

As for the free-for-all world of over-the-counter remedies, in this case they no longer cut it. Many are long past their “best before” date and their side effects can often be devastating.

Like it or not, the next Yukon government's going to have to take its Peel pills.

Peel drops off Mega Uranium's radar

2011-06-17T13:01:00.000-07:00

Toronto-based Mega Uranium holds thousands of acres of ground in the Peel watershed but you'd never know it from company news releases.

Take its latest "update on Canadian exploration" on June 16. Much is made of its mineral plays in Labrador, Saskatchewan and Ontario but not a word about the Yukon. It's been that way for a couple of years now and its website info isn't much more enlightening.

Mega Uranium jointly holds 1,322 mineral claims in the Wind and Bonnet Plume River region with penny stock partner, Cash Minerals (aka Pitchblack Resources).

At 51 acres per claim, that's about 67,400 acres of prime wilderness real estate.

Alot of land, yes, but considerably less than the nearly 200,000 acres the so-called Yukon Uranium Joint Venture lorded over in 2007 when the two companies were at the height of their activity.

Since then the pair let more than 2,500 claims expire before the Yukon government swooped down in 2010 with an offer they couldn't refuse - automatic renewal at no cost until there's Peel land use plan.

Mega Uranium’s principal properties are in Australia, including two in the state of Queensland where uranium mining is currently banned.

Its board includes former Yukon Energy Corporation president Michael Sweatman, now a Vancouver consultant and vice-president of Run of River Power Inc.

The company acquired the Peel claims in 2007 when it bought out Twenty-Seven Capital Corp., an Archer Cathro company which cut the original deal with Cash Minerals.

It included a chance for Cash to up its interest to 75% in the Igor property, promoted as the most promising, by producing a bankable feasibility study by 2012.

That's unlikely to happen since no work has been done on the claims for three years. The price of uranium is less than half of its 2007 peak and its future looks dim after the nuclear disaster in Japan.

As for Cash Minerals/Pitchblack Resources it's a mere shadow of its former self.

Most recently it cut its board of directors to three from five. President and CEO Fred Leigh, who replaced Doug Currie in April is joined by long-time director William Clarke, who used to head the Canadian Nuclear Association, and newcomer Scott Moore.

Although financier Stan Bharti steppped down as chair at Pitchblack's annual meeting June 10, his main company, Forbes & Manhattan, is still listed as the place to contact Leigh.

Bharti heads about a dozen junior exploration companies, including Largo Resources which holds the Northern Dancer tungsten-molybdenum project in southern Yukon. It recently proposed powering the project with coal or a small-scale nuclear plant. (See Yukon News story: Companies want coal, nuclear and fossil fuel power)

Big hole in Peel water data: report

2011-06-10T13:21:00.000-07:00

The Blackstone water survey station, one of only two in the Peel.

A new government report on Yukon water and climate change says there’s a “large gap” when it comes to information on the Peel River drainage.

"A high-level investigation of spatial coverage indicates that hydrometric, meteorological and snow networks provide good regional coverage in the territory, although a large gap is apparent in the coverage of water quality in the northern Yukon, with no active stations in the Peel watershed, “ says the report, Yukon Water: An Assessment of Climate Change Vulnerabilities.

Only one study has ever been done on the basin's water quality. The five-year federal study, completed in 2007, found the quality to be acceptable. Ottawa promised to do more sampling upstream from Fort McPherson, N.W.T. and take another look in 2012.

The data on water volume isn't much better. Only two water survey stations were active as of March, 2010, according to the report's maps. One is on the Blackstone River, beside the Dempster Highway, and the other on Canyon Creek, just above the Peel’s Aberdeen Canyon.

And only one of the Peel's four snow survey stations measures the white stuff outside of the highway corridor. It’s on the watershed’s southern border, near the headwaters of the Snake and Bonnetplume River.

Given that water is the Peel's greatest resource it's more than a little ironic that governments have paid so little attention to it.

Especially in light of climate change.

“Climate change is already altering, and will continue to alter, the hydrologic cycle in Yukon, affecting not only water-course flows, volumes, and timing, but also the quality of the water,” says the Environment Yukon report.

“These changes will inevitably affect every aspect of Yukon life, from day-to-day household practices to industrial development and energy generation."

The big melt sends mud sliding in the Peel.

Yukon temperatures are rising and forecast to continue that upward trend, it says. Precipitation, especially in winter, is expected to increase. And snow isn’t coming as early or staying as long.

That’s not to mention melting permafrost and shrinking glaciers – 22% in past 50 years.

The need to monitor and respond to climate change – including its impact on water – is an emerging national and territorial priority, the reports says.

Good information will be vital to planners and decision makers, it says, although it stops short of recommending more be done in the Peel.

The Yukon government has now launched a new website dedicated exclusively to water resources - http://www.yukonwater.ca/.

Point & click to protect the Peel

2011-06-08T09:25:00.000-07:00

No fuss, no muss, no bother.

Simply click here to add your voice to the growing chorus of people who want to protect the Peel watershed from industrial development.

The web-based Statement of Support backs the First Nations' call to protect their cultural homeland - all 16.8 million acres of pristine wilderness.

The goal: to get 1,500 Yukoners to sign on by the end of July as well as several thousand more from the rest of Canada and the world.

With a territorial election in the offing - it must be called by Oct. 14 - political hopefuls need to know the Peel is important to voters as they choose a new government.

The ruling Yukon Party opposes protection, preferring the watershed remain a playground for pump and dump penny stock companies.

Its newly-elected leader, druggist Darrell Pasloski, is expected to take the party even further to the right.

Both the NDP and Liberals say they support 80 per cent protection as recommended by the Peel Regional Land Use Planning Commission.

The commission is wrapping up work on a final plan. It's expected to out for public consultation by mid-August.

You'll find more information at protectpeel.ca.

Canadian Geographic zooms in on Peel

2011-06-07T12:07:00.000-07:00

This is an excerpt from Canadian Geographic's Peel watershed feature by writer Leslie Anthony and photographer Fritz Mueller:

What is wilderness? The thought, which has hovered all morning, turns on its side as our float plane tips steeply into the alpine vale cradling Duo Lake, in the headwaters of the Snake River. Below, brocaded in olive, mustard and bluegreen, Yukon mountainsides jut above jade spires of dwarf spruce and the puce darkness between them. The palette is unfamiliar yet vibrant. It exists here in an undisturbed state — undisturbed, that is, by us.

Mount MacDonald provides the perfect photo opp.

The definition of wilderness that I’ve been mulling is a matter of degree to the human mind: not this but that; some but not all; us but not them. The problem is that all of these constructs are ours, relative and contextual. Real wilderness defines itself: the natural intertwining of landforms and waterways; the presence of indigenous, co-evolved plant and animal life; intact ecosystems operating the way they have since they arose.

No matter the perspective, there is room for humanity, since we are a part and not apart. It would seem, however, that we must not mess with functionality — certainly not with the functionality of aquatic ecosystems, whose components are more easily perturbed and whose problems are quickly distributed over large areas.

The idea comes sharply into focus as we near our destination, the isolated Snake River. The Snake is considered pristine: no roads, no residents, no development. It’s a wild and rugged watercourse that we will follow for 10 days and 300 kilometres to its junction with the Peel River.

First and foremost, the trip is an exploration by canoe. But it will also offer insight into the hot-button politics of protecting the entire Peel watershed, of which the Snake is the last of six rivers — preceded, from west to east, by the Ogilvie, Blackstone, Hart, Wind and Bonnet Plume — to join the former’s flow within the Yukon’s boundaries (another, the Rat, makes the Peel’s acquaintance in the Northwest Territories).

On the side of protection and conservation are First Nations with traditional hunting grounds in the Peel, backed by tour operators and environmental organizations, such as the Yukon Conservation Society and the Yukon chapter of the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society. On the side of exploitation is the Yukon’s traditional economic engine — the mining and oil and gas industries — intent on preserving leases that have been staked on uranium, iron and oil and gas deposits. A land-use planning process involving an arm’slength commission of stakeholders has been under way for seven years. It is winding down after having recommended to the Yukon government that 80.6 percent of the Peel watershed be fully protected and the rest closely regulated, a decision with overwhelming public support. With a final decision expected this fall, the fight for the Snake is heating up. A chance to experience it in its current state is an opportunity I can’t turn down.

After all, if any place can school me on wilderness values, it should be a pristine river.

Click here to read the rest of this June, 2011 feature story on the Peel watershed, Snake Run.

Return to the drawing board - do not pass go

2011-06-03T17:00:00.000-07:00

A Yukon company that wants to fire up a mine in the middle of Tombstone Territorial Park this summer is getting a cool reception from environmental assessors.

This is the second time Canadian United Minerals Inc. has applied to the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board for permission to work its gold and uranium claims near the headwaters of the Peel’s Blackstone River.

Last summer the assessment board rejected the company's request to drill holes, dig trenches and blast with dynamite to get at the ore which it would then haul to the Dempster Highway by snowmachine.

It said the impact of all that industrial activity would be too great, and the Yukon government agreed.

This new proposal, submitted May 12, is only slightly different than the first. The company has nixed the drilling and the winter snow machine ore hauls along the Blackstone River. Instead it now wants to use only helicopters for transportation, mostly in the summer.

It plans to work the claims between July and September (which is also peak visitor season) and use its existing camp to house up to eight workers.

It also promises to clean up all the contaminated soil caused by its work to date, something it didn't mention in its 2010 application.

But, like the first proposal, this new application is a little shy on details and in some places the contradictory information is confusing.

That's not going to fly this time around, says the assessment board's Dawson office in a June 3 letter to company president Joel White.

The board needs a clear and complete proposal before it can even decide whether to accept it for review.

“We have reviewed your project proposal…and have determined that supplementary information is required in order to consider the proposal adequate and commence the evaluation,” it says before reaming off four pages of questions about the project and its impacts.

The Horn claims have been controversial from the start.

Staked after park planning was well underway, but before the boundaries were finalized, Canadian United was the only company which didn't voluntarily relinquish its claims.

Successive governments didn’t have the jam to expropriate them and attempts to get rid of them through the courts by the Tr’ondek Hwech'in First Nation were not successful.

No work has been done on the claims for more than five years. The company’s last five-year mining land use permit expired in May, 2010.

The company has until the end of November to answer YESAB's many questions or ask for an extension.

The two Tombstone Park mining proposals and related correspondence are posted on the YESAB online registry.

A shift in the Yukon's political winds

2011-04-29T06:57:00.000-07:00

A Datapath Systems poll conducted just days before Premier Dennis Fentie announced his resignation this week shows support for his Yukon Party on the rise after months of languishing in last place.

“For the first time since their slide began in June of 2009, the Yukon Party is moving back up in the poll results,” the Yukon-based market research company says in a news release.

The once unpopular Yukon Party is now running neck-in-neck with the NDP. The Liberals, who had led the poll through 2010, are now on the downslide.

The polls shows the Yukon Party at 32 per cent among decided voters, the NDP at 31 per cent and the Liberals at 25 per cent.

Willard Phelps’ United Citizens Party garnered five per cent while another eight per cent opted for other. Some of those mentioned the fledgling territorial Green Party.

Since the polling company last tested the territory's political winds in December, 2010, the number of undecided voters has dropped to 21 per cent from 27 per cent.

When asked whether they would chose a different party if it had a different leader, 33 per cent of those polled said yes. That means one in three Yukoners might re-evaluate their current party selection under new leadership, says Datapath.

The Yukon Party is in the process of doing just that. Economic Development Minister Jim Kenyon, retired pharmacist Darrell Pasloski and tourism operator Rod Taylor are vying to fill Fentie's shoes on May 28.

As for issues, the poll found that the environment, poor government, housing and drug/alcohol problems are top of mind while "the economy has dropped to the seventh position after years of being in the number one or two slot.”

Another interesting revelation: 39 per cent, or more than one in three Yukoners, are “very concerned about the increase in mining and development happening in the Yukon.”

The non-commissioned poll was conducted between April 16 and 23. Telephone surveys were done with 273 Whitehorse residents and 125 non-Whitehorse residents.

                    April 2011 Dec. 2010   July 2010

Liberals             25%             33%          39%

NDP                     31%             30%           26%

Yukon Party    32%              24%           22%

Undecided        21%              27%           39%

Boreal Forest Blue(s)

2011-03-18T12:52:00.000-07:00

Canada’s boreal is not only the world’s largest intact forest, it’s also a giant carbon storehouse and the most water-rich region in the world.

Its water is as important as its land.

A true blue forest.

Protecting this global treasure should be a top priority, says the Pew Environment Group’s new report, A Forest of Blue: Canada’s Boreal Forest, the World’s Waterkeeper.

Stretching across the continent from Newfoundland to the North – including the Peel watershed – the boreal makes a huge contribution that can no longer be taken for granted, it says.

The boreal:
• contains millions of pristine lakes, thousands of free-flowing rivers and 25% of the planet's wetlands
• provides an estimated $700 billion value annually as a buffer against climate change and food and water shortages
• offers the last refuge for many sea-run migratory fish
• maintains freshwater flows critical to forming Arctic sea ice, which cools the atmosphere and supports marine life, from sea algae to polar bears
• stores more than 400 trillion pounds of carbon in lakes and river delta sediment, peatlands and wetlands - more than any other terrestrial source in the world

Despite its incredible natural wealth, the health of the boreal is under increasing threat from large-scale industrial activity such as mining and oil/gas development.

“At a time when clean water supplies are disappearing, the vast reserves in Canada’s boreal are increasingly important to protect,” said Pew spokesman Steve Kallick in a March 16 news release.

“Canadian provinces and First Nations have already made major strides defending the integrity of the vast lakes, rivers and wetlands in the forest, but they need to do more to guarantee that Canada’s water stays pure and abundant, watershed by watershed,” he said.

About 12 per cent of the boreal is currently protected, but the goal is to increase that to 50 per cent, with the rest to be managed in a truly sustainable manner.

To reach that goal, the report concludes major changes are needed to mining laws and hydro-power policy. Wetlands also need particular attention.

It also singled out the Mackenzie watershed, saying more needs to be done to protect it from industrial activity and to implement the Mackenzie Basin agreement.

Click here to read the full report.

Exposing the Great Divide

2011-03-16T15:19:00.000-07:00

The rugged mountains of the Continental Divide snake their way from the Yukon's southeastern corner up through to its northwest, gently parting major watersheds along the way.

Wrapping itself around a good part of the Peel's perimeter, the divide provides a protective barrier between the largely pristine watershed and the industrial hustle and bustle of the much busier Yukon River drainage.

A "great wall" of sorts. A deterrent to those who crave easier access to the region.

But the Great Divide is more than a geographical reality.

It also aptly symbolizes the huge gulf that lies between those who treasure the Peel as it is and those who see its wealth only in what may lie under the ground.

That ever-widening gap is explored in the March issue of Up here magazine. Writer Lauren McKeon delves into the debate with her story, The Great Divide.

The magazine's also posted up an online poll to take its own tally of public sentiment.

So far the conservationists are winning handily, but the industrial developers may pick up steam so be sure to vote.

Peel needs mines & roads, says Yukon gov't

2011-02-22T17:32:00.000-08:00

Yukon casts dark cloud over Peel.

The Yukon government is bound and determined to see roads and mines developed in the Peel watershed.

In its official response to the Peel planning commission’s recommended land use plan this week, the right-wing Yukon Party government completely rejects large-scale protection in favour of industrial development.

The commission’s plan, released in 2009, calls for 80 per cent of the watershed to be protected. It concluded there's no way to have it all - conservation, renewable resource use and non-renewable resource use - without conflict.

But the Yukon government disagrees, insisting all can co-exist and urging planners to go back to the drawing board.

“We request that the commission re-examine the location, nature and potential extent of current and future conflicts between the values of conservation, non-consumptive resource use and resource development,” it writes in its response.

Likewise, it refuses to accept the ban on new roads in the region.

“The Yukon government recognizes that managing surface access (winter and all-season roads) can be challenging but not impossible. We believe a ban on surface access is not a workable scenario in a region with existing land interests and future development potential,” it says.

“We would like to see a range of access options developed which consider the various conservation and resource values throughout the region and also take into account existing regulatory tools and best management practices which can be used to mitigate risk and limit other user’s access.”

The Yukon government’s response to the plan is completely at odds with the response from the four affected First Nations. They're calling for 100 per cent protection of this globally significant wilderness region.

“In the public consultation process we were inspired, though not surprised, to hear that this area holds similar values for the vast majority of Yukoners,” say the First Nations in their joint response.

The government should “explore creative solutions” to deal with more than 8,000 existing mineral claims in the Peel, they say.

“These could include suspension of the requirement to perform assessment work, the ability to freely locate mining claims outside the planning region in exchange for the relinquishment of claims within the planning region, or the recording of assessment work credits on claims outside the planning region in exchange for relinquishing claims within the planning region - all of which are devices which have been previously utilized in Yukon,” they write.

The First Nations say they're not against mining, but they don't want it to happen in the Peel.

“We also note that the curtailment of industrial activities in the Peel is not depressing economic and industrial activities in the Yukon. In spite of the mineral withdrawal in the Peel, the Yukon is experiencing a huge economic boom, especially in the mining sector,” they say.

With all the response to the recommended plan now in hand, the six-member Peel planning commission will get back to work.

It’s been asked to produce a final recommended plan by early July. That will then go out for another round of public consultation before going back to the governments for final approval.

Under the latest timeline agreed to by the five governments, final approval should take place in October.

Read related stories:
Haggling continues over Peel plan (Yukon News, Feb. 23, 2011)
First Nations, territory far apart on Peel's future (Whitehorse Star, Feb. 22, 2011)

Peel claims part of Newmont-Fronteer deal

2011-02-18T12:16:00.000-08:00

Hundreds of Fronteer claims lie within the Bonnet Plume valley.

Fronteer Gold, one of the largest mineral claim holders in the Peel watershed, may soon be swallowed up by U.S.-based global gold giant Newmont Mining.

Newmont wants to buy most of Fronteer’s assets, mainly for its premier gold properties in Nevada and Turkey. But the company’s 1,835 claims in the Bonnet Plume region are also included in the proposed deal.

“The [Peel]claims are part of the assets falling under the assets to be acquired by Newmont,” said Fronteer spokesman Glen Edwards in a Feb. 17 e-mail.

“However Newmont’s strategic focus in the proposed acquisition were our Nevada assets,” he added.

Fronteer Gold, formerly Fronteer Development Group, staked most of its Peel claims between 2005 and 2007 when it conducted a major uranium exploration program in the Bonnet Plume area.

No more work has been done since and it wrote off the Peel properties several years ago, said Edwards.

The company had been simply letting its claims expire until the Yukon government jumped in last year, providing free automatic renewal for all expiring Peel claims while the moratorium on staking any new ones was in place.

Almost half of Fronteer’s 1,835 remaining claims carry a 2011 expiry date. Without this government "relief" it would have to pay $100 or do that amount of work keep each claim in good standing.

Fronteer says it “cannot divest the claims during the moratorium.” This suggests it would likely let them lapse if given the choice.

Most of Fronteer’s claims were staked after the Peel land use planning commission began its work in late 2004. The plan it produced calls for 80 per cent of the watershed to be protected from industrial development, including the Bonnet Plume valley.

All told there are about 8,250 active quartz claims in the Peel watershed. The Yukon government says it will not expropriate claims or compensate claimholders to make way for protection.

Current claim owners can still work their ground while the staking ban on new claims is in place. It runs out Feb. 4, 2012.

The deal between Fronteer and Newmont should be finalized in April.

Newmont is one of the world’s largest gold producers. It operates in eight countries and has more than 35,000 employees and contractors.

It has one project in Canada -Nunavut’s Hope Bay gold mine, east of Bathurst Inlet on the Arctic coast.

But it’s no stranger to the Peel watershed.

During the 1990s, it explored some of the same claims in the Bonnet Plume area it’s now poised to inherit in the Fronteer deal. Along with partner, Westmin Resources, it also built the controversial airstrip at Copper Point.

New deal, new deadlines for Peel land plan

2011-02-03T17:48:00.000-08:00

The Peel watershed land use planning commission may be able to get back to work in a couple of weeks if the Yukon government holds true to its latest promise.

Under a new agreement between the Yukon and the four affected First Nations - Na-cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Vuntut Gwitchin and the Gwich'in Tribal Council - the Peel commission should receive a formal response to its recommended land use plan by the middle of February.

That may be a joint response from all five parties or, if they can’t agree, which is more likely, they will respond separately.

Mount McDonald, the Peel's highest peak, slowly reveals itself.

The plan, released in December, 2009, says 80 per cent of the watershed should be protected from industrial development.

Up to this point, the Yukon Party government has vehemently opposed any protection in the watershed. Several weeks ago it rejected the overall plan, but has yet to provide any further details.

The First Nations, on the other hand, want 100 per cent protection for the region.

If the Yukon government actually meets the mid-February deadline, then the commission will be reconvened to begin work on the next version.

Based on this assumption, the new "work plan" in the agreement then gives the commission until the end of June to prepare the "final recommended plan."

That plan will then be taken out for another round of public consultation, beginning in mid-August and slated for a month, according to the new timetable.

As per the land claims agreement, consultation meetings will be held in Old Crow, Mayo, Dawson City, Fort McPherson and Whitehorse. Other affected First Nations can also participate if they wish, says the agreement.

A "final decision on a final Peel land use plan" is expected by the beginning of November at the latest, say the five parties to the deal.

The Yukon government has to call a general election this fall. That means the plan will likely not be finalized before residents go to the polls.

Click here to read the full agreement.

Porcupine caribou numbers go up not down

2011-01-21T11:25:00.000-08:00

Dempster Highway hunters waiting for the Peel River ferry are reminded to report their caribou harvest.

To everyone’s surprise, the Porcupine caribou herd has bucked its downward trend and may even be growing in size.

Preliminary results from aerial photos taken last July show there are at least 123,000 caribou in the barrenground herd and Alaskan biologists are still counting the many tiny specks.

A final tally for the herd won’t be ready until March, but officials are confident its numbers are on the rise. There were 123,000 caribou when the last census was conducted in 2001.

That was down 55,000 from its peak of 178,000 in 1989.

Based on that data and other factors, the herd's current population had been pegged at 90,000 to 100,000 before this latest count, according to figures on the Porcupine Caribou Management Board website.

An estimated 4,000 caribou are harvested annually by hunters in the Yukon, N.W.T. and Alaska as the herd migrates between its coastal calving grounds and the mountains and forests of the interior.

The Peel and Porcupine watersheds make up a large part of the herd’s fall and wintering range. The caribou often spend time in the Dempster Highway area where many hunters take advantage of the easy access.

Last year the federal, Yukon and N.W.T. governments, the Gwich'in Tribal Council, Vuntut Gwitchin, Tr'ondek Hwech'in, Na-cho Nyak Dun and Inuvialuit Game Council agreed to a harvest management plan for the herd.

The plan, which ties harvest limits to the herd’s population, requires all hunters to report their harvest. That’s never been done before.

When the herd has more than 115,000 caribou – like now – licensed hunters would be allowed to shoot two bulls a year and aboriginal hunters would face no limits in terms of numbers or gender.

If that number drops below 115,000, the plans says licensed hunters would only be allowed to kill one bull and aboriginal hunters would be asked to voluntarily hunt only bulls.

More drastic hunting restrictions would kick in if the herd falls below 80,000.

The first annual meeting, agreed to as part of the harvest management plan, will be held Feb. 8 – 10 in Inuvik.

They’ll review the new numbers and decide what course of action needs to be taken to ensure a healthy herd, says Environment Yukon in a news release.

Hunting restrictions the Yukon put in place in 2009, when it believed the herd was in decline, will be reconsidered, it says.

An implementation plan to accompany the management plan has not yet been finalized.

80% to 90% favour protection: Peel review

2011-01-14T09:34:00.000-08:00

Mount Royal radiates its beauty over the Wind River valley.

An independent review of the recent Peel consultation process has found the vast majority of people who participated want the region protected from industrial development.

Between 80 and 90 per cent of those who either spoke at one of the community meetings or submitted their comments to the consultation website urged the Yukon government to protect the Peel.

The review was done by DataPath Systems for the Yukon Conservation Society, CPAWS-Yukon and the Wilderness Tourism Association of the Yukon, the groups said in a Jan. 13 news release.

“Looking at the total input at public meetings and on-line, 79-80 per cent specifically said they want at least the 80 per cent protection that has been recommended by the planning commission. Removing those who did not state a specific percentage they want protected shows 90 per cent in favour of 100 per cent protection,” said YCS executive director Karen Baltgailis.

Comments from more than 380 people during the August/September consultation period, plus petitions signed by 982 others, were analyzed in the review.

People went to a lot of trouble to attend meetings and speak out, and provide written comments, but the government has not provided any final analysis of all the information it collected.

It's telling that the Yukon government has said nothing about the results of the public consultations, said Gill Cracknell, CPAWS-Yukon conservation campaigner.

“Perhaps they prefer to ignore input that does not agree with their desire for roads and industrial development in the Peel,” she said.

Just before Christmas the Yukon government released its long-awaited position on the Peel plan: it flatly rejected the proposal to protect 80 per cent of the watershed.

Although it has since been heavily criticized for refusing to listen to the wishes of the people and ignoring the democratic process, it seems determined to throw the region open to unfettered development.

Baltgailis said she hoped the government was “not just paying lip service to the requirement in the [land claim] final agreements to consult as part of the land use planning process.”

What was the point consultations if the government's not going to listen to what it heard, she added.

Datapath Systems is an independent full-service market research company based in the Yukon.

Click here to read the full review.

Click here to listen to CBC Yukon Airplay Jan. 14 interview about the review with Baltgailis.

See also related stories:
Yukon gov’t rejects land use plan (Dec. 20, 2010)
Consultation meetings (series of stories from Summer/Fall 2010)

Chevron's early renewal wouldn't fly in N.W.T.

2011-01-11T14:50:00.000-08:00

An old Chevron "calling card" near the leases.

If Chevron asked the N.W.T. mining recorder’s office to renew its lease on its Crest iron ore deposit, it 'd be told to come back in 2014 when the lease is due to expire.

The Yukon has no such qualms.

Instead the territorial government seems to have bent over backwards to extend the oil giant’s hold on a huge swath of land in the Snake River valley – a mountainous area marked for the highest degree of protection under the Peel land use plan.

Touted as a world-class deposit ever since it was discovered by company geologists in 1961, it’s partly in the Yukon and partly in the N.W.T. Chevron holds iron leases for the deposit on both sides of the border. They were last renewed in the early 1990s and are due to expire in 2013-14.

Although Chevron applied for early renewal of its 525 Yukon leases in 2009, it made no such request in the N.W.T.

And even if it had've asked, it would have been turned down, says Marcia Moss, the N.W.T.’s deputy mining recorder.

“Renew early? They don’t have to renew early. There is no mechanism to renew early - like they don’t expire until 2014,” said Moss in a telephone interview this week.

“But if they submitted a letter to renew, we would just hold on to that letter until 2014 to renew it or tell them to not submit it until closer to that date because generally it’s a very quick process as long as they’ve complied with the regulations and have their rent paid.”

Chevron’s original 190 N.W.T. iron claims were combined into one 9,788-acre (3,961-hectare) lease in 1972. They now pay an annual rental fee of $2 per acre or $19,576.

Its Yukon claims were converted into 525 individual leases, most about 160 acres in size. They pay a one-time fee of $610 or $321,000 when they renew for another 21 years.

Since Chevron last renewed its Yukon leases, the territorial government has taken over responsibility for managing lands and resources from Ottawa.

When Chevron came asking for early renewal – just weeks before the Peel land use plan was released in late 2009 – the Yukon government said no problem and drafted a new agreement that would deal with the three-year “overlap” between the end of the existing leases and the start of the new ones.

The overlap clause say the new leases will kick in when the old ones run out “if the lessee provides evidence to the satisfaction of Yukon that during the term of the existing lease it complied in every respect with the conditions of the mining lease.”

Chevron officials in Calgary recently signed the new leases and sent them back to the Yukon. The mining lands manager with Energy, Mines and Resources is expected to soon sign off them without further ado despite the fact the company still hasn't cleaned up the mess it left nearly 50 years ago.

See related stories:
Chevron makes early bid to keep Crest leases (PWN April 9, 2010)
Crest ignores contaminated Crest site (PWN May 17, 2010)
Chevron should clean up contaminated sites, relinquish claims (PWN June 25, 2010)
Chevron plans to cling to ore deposit (Whse. Star July 8, 2010)
Chevron's messy legacy in the Peel (Yukon News July 23, 2010)
Portrait of an iron play: Chevron & the Peel (PWN July 23, 2010)

Poll puts ruling Yukon Party dead last

2011-01-05T07:56:00.000-08:00

If the latest public opinion poll is any indication, the right-wing Yukon Party government could soon be history.

For the second time in a row, the DataPath Systems poll shows the party bringing up the rear when it comes to popularity among decided voters.

The Liberal Party held onto the lead in the December poll with 33 per cent, but that’s down six points from the previous poll done last July. Some of that support may have moved to the NDP which saw an increase to 30 per cent from 26 per cent.

Lagging far behind its two rivals, the Yukon Party had 24 per cent, up slightly from its low of 22 per cent last summer.

Thirteen per cent said they’d vote for “other” while 27 per cent said they were still undecided.

Two issues tied for top spot – the environment and poor governance. Education was third, followed by the economy.

Politicos of all stripes will be examining these poll results carefully as they prepare for the upcoming territorial election that has to be called this year.

Federally, Liberal MP Larry Bagnell continues to enjoy strong support. The poll has him sitting at 47 per cent compared to the Conservatives at 23 per cent, the Greens at 20 per cent and the NDP at 10 per cent.

But even though Bagnell was the favoured MP, 37 per cent of those polled said they preferred Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper to lead the country.

DataPath Systems, an independent Yukon-based market research company, surveyed 304 residents between Dec. 2 and 15 for this non-commissioned poll.

                 December        July            March        March
                    2010                 2010             2010           2009
Lib               33                      39                    36                  27

NDP            30                      26                   23                16

YP                24                       22                   25                  47

Yukon gov't rejects Peel plan, buys time

2010-12-20T10:23:00.000-08:00

Remnants of past "development" in the Peel watershed.

The Yukon government has thrown the book at a plan to protect 80 per cent of the Peel watershed.

Simply put, it wants mining, roads and other industrial development to continue unfettered throughout the watershed.

Completely ignoring five years of work by the Peel Watershed Planning Commission, three rounds of public consultation and crystal-clear calls for 100 per cent protection from the First Nations, the Yukon government has decided to bull ahead with its 1950s vision for the region.

“In proposing a high level of protection for such a large portion of the region, the commission appears to have interpreted the Chapter 11 objectives and processes in a way that is inconsistent with the Yukon government view of the final agreements,” it says in one of three separate Peel news releases it fired out late Friday afternoon.

Instead, it wants the plan to provide “a more balanced consideration” of what takes place in the region.

“YG feels that a broader mix of uses is achievable within the definition of sustainable development as provided in the final agreements. That is, that beneficial socio-economic change can be realized without undermining the ecological and social systems.”

The plan needs to include options for roads and other surface access for current and future developments, it says.

“Although access is a challenging management consideration, access provisions should be consistent with the final agreements,” it says.

“Access provisions could vary in the region depending on conservation values and land management zoning and a range of satisfactory options could be developed to address the matter of access.”

It also takes exception to the commission’s application of the precautionary principle.

“The planning area has a natural mix of resources and YG believes that there should be the ability to accommodate mixed uses for society’s need that errs on the side of caution with protection a consideration through determination of level of risk,” it says.

In short, the right-wing Yukon Party government of Dennis Fentie has not softened its anti-protection stance one iota since the planning process began in late 2004.

It has totally dismissed the result of a democratic land use planning process because it's not the result it wanted.

Rather it's decided to take one last run at ramming its position through before voters get a say in the matter sometime in 2011.

Although it says it hopes to reach a Peel deal by the end of Febraruy, that seems unlikely since the two sides are so far apart.

As for the staking ban, the government says it’s willing to extend it for another year. But it also implies that may hinge on whether the "relief" provided to mineral claim holders is also extended.

See three government news releases sent out on Dec. 17, 2010
Effective implementation emphasized in Peel plan discussions
Progress continues on Peel Watershed Regional Land Use Plan
Staking withdrawal to support Peel Watershed regional planning process

See related news stories:
YTG's Peel watershed stance earning poor reviews
(Whitehorse Star Dec. 21, 2010)
First Nation calls for clarity on watershed
(Whitehorse Star Dec. 21, 2010)
YTG rejects blueprint for watershed
(Whitehorse Star Dec. 20, 2010)
Yukon disagrees with Peel watershed plan
(CBC News Dec. 17, 2010)
Peel land-use plan too protective: YTG
(Yukon News Dec. 17, 2010)

Northern Mountain caribou plan in slowcooker

2010-12-16T12:08:00.000-08:00

A plan to save the Northern Mountain woodland caribou of the Yukon, western N.W.T. and northern B.C. is nearly a year overdue and still nowhere in sight.

Not even a draft version has been presented to the public after nearly six years of work.

In the meantime, industrial activity in the homelands of the caribou carries on unabated.

The plan could help determine land use in the Peel watershed, home to the Bonnet Plume and Hart herds and within the range of the Redstone, Tay and Clear Creek herds.

Northern Mountain caribou were officially listed as a species of “special concern” under the Species at Risk Act in January, 2005. Once a species is listed, Ottawa is supposed to produce a draft management plan within three years and a final plan within five.

The Environment Canada-led planning team – which included representatives from the Yukon, B.C., N.W.T., 13 First Nations and three management boards - wrapped up its work on the draft in May, its website says.

But the details of that draft remain under lock and key.

The federal department doesn’t make any apologies for the delay, saying only the draft is undergoing revisions and should be released before the end of March.

“Due to the high cultural and subsistence importance of Northern Mountain caribou, Environment Canada led a wide-reaching and collaborative process with provinces and territories and aboriginal groups and government to develop the draft plan,” department spokesperson Mark Johnson said in a recent e-mail.

“This collaborative process, which was well received and will lay a solid foundation for the conservation of this species, did take longer than anticipated. It was felt that it was crucial the provinces, territories and Aboriginal groups, who are ultimately responsible for management of individual caribou herds, be involved in the process from the beginning.”

When the draft is released, it'll be posted on the Species at Risk Act Public Registry website. The public will have 60 days to comment and then a final plan will be prepared.

Experts say there are 36 Northern Mountain caribou herds, but the total population is unknown. A 2002 study for the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC), which sparked the listing, made a best guess of 44,000 in all. The status of 14 herds was "unknown", three were in decline, 15 were stable and four were on the rise.

But a lot has happened since then throughout the Yukon, western N.W.T. and northern B.C. Mines such as Minto and Cantung have fired up, mineral exploration has skyrocketed and proposals for large industrial projects from pipelines to power projects to railways have once again materialized.

In the Peel, no new claims were permitted this year, but work continued on some of the 8,000 claims that were staked during the 2005-08 rush to grab ground before the land use plan was finalized.

Plan expected to paint clearer caribou picture

If the Northern Caribou management plan lives up to its billing, it’ll provide a comprehensive overview of the health of this group of woodland caribou and measures to stem any further decline in numbers.

It’ll set out “population and habitat goals and objectives” as well as identify “key knowledge gaps and general research and management needs,” says the plan’s online newsletter.

It’ll also include recent and historic status, monitoring history and threats to the herds and their habitats, as well as provide “recommendations for management actions for individual herds that will serve as a guide to the development of various regional or herd specific plans by the responsible jurisdictions.”

There are only 184,000 forest-dwelling woodland caribou left in Canada. More than half of them live a sheltered life on the island of Newfoundland.

In addition to Northern Mountain caribou, the Peel is also has some Boreal woodland caribou, mostly in the plateau area and provides an important fall and wintering area for the migrating barrenground Porcupine herd.

Peel protectors win the day in Yukon byelection

2010-12-14T14:06:00.000-08:00

The Yukon NDP cruised to victory in Whitehorse Centre this week, easily holding on to the riding which went up for grabs after Todd Hardy died from cancer.

Leader Liz Hanson captured 356 votes, putting her well ahead of Liberal Kirk Cameron, who received 181, and the Yukon Party’s Mike Nixon with 150.

Housing, or rather the lack thereof, dominated the pre-Christmas campaign, but protection of the Peel watershed was also on voters’ minds as candidates went door-to-door.

Both the NDP and the Liberals support the proposed Peel land use plan which would protect 80 per cent of the region.

Not so the governing Yukon Party. And perhaps its dismal third place finish – despite holding all the cards in this race – is a reflection of its anti-protection stance.

When asked whether his party supported Peel protection, candidate Mike Nixon first dodged the question, marching out the usual government gibberish about planning and land claims and process.

Then he denied the results of three public consultation processes and a Yukon-wide poll – all that proved up overwhelming support for protecting the Peel.

Finally, he more or less dismissed the concept of joint land use planning and the last six years of work by the Peel planning commission (which includes two of its own appointees) by gently reminding everyone the Yukon controls 97.3 per cent of the Peel, implying it can and will do whatever it wants regardless of how First Nations feel about it.

Nixon's response, combined with recent government threats to tax tourism companies for protected areas, its "relief order" that extended mineral claims for free, and its political interference earlier in the process, makes it pretty obvious where the Yukon Party stands.

Of course it’s totally opposed to Peel protection. It just doesn’t seem to have the guts to say so.

But Yukon voters aren’t stupid and the Peel issue isn’t going anywhere soon.

The next general election has to be called by the fall of 2011. Sometime between now and then it's going to have come clean because voters will expect and deserve a straight answer.

See related stories:
Landslide Liz gives NDP another seat
(Dec. 14, 2010 Yukon News)
NDP's Hanson elected Whitehorse Centre MLA
(Dec. 13, 2010 CBC News)
Q and A: the Peel, the plan and the political parties
(Dec. 9, 2010 Peel Watershed News)
Watershed resolution may need more time
(Dec. 3, 2010 Whitehorse Star)
Yukon Party drops to third place in poll
(Aug. 10, 2010 Peel Watershed News)

Q & A: the Peel, the plan & the political parties

2010-12-09T14:48:00.000-08:00

The future of the Peel has become an issue in the Dec. 13 Whitehorse Centre byelection campaign. Here's what the three parties had to say in a YCS/CPAWS-Yukon questionnaire.

1. Do you and your party support the Peel planning commission’s draft recommended Peel watershed land use plan, which recommends protection for just over 80% of the Peel watershed?

Mike Nixon, Yukon Party: I support the approach taken by the Yukon Party government. The Yukon Party government supports and is obliged to follow the process for “Land Use Planning” outlined in Chapter 11 of the Umbrella Final Agreement. Section 11.6.0 sets out the “approval process for land use plans” and the Yukon Party government is currently following the steps outlined in the approval process. The first regional land use plan approved under this process was the North Yukon regional land use plan achieved by the Yukon Party government and the Vuntut Gwitchin government on June 29, 2009. This comprehensive and balanced land use plan marked a milestone in land claims implementation. No previous Yukon government had succeeded in developing a regional land use plan since the Umbrella Final Agreement was signed off by the Yukon Party government in 1993. The present Yukon Party government is looking forward to finalizing the Peel watershed land use plan.

Kirk Cameron, Liberal Party: Thank you for your questions. The Yukon Liberal Party has been on record for some time in support of the draft recommended plan and as the Liberal candidate in Whitehorse Centre I support the plan. The Yukon Liberal Party is the only party to bring forward a motion in support of the draft plan, in the legislative assembly. Where the Yukon Party stands on this matter remains a mystery, as neither the government nor the candidate has put a position on the public record. This is an important issue and voters in Whitehorse Centre need to know where all candidates stand on the future of the Peel so that they are in a good position to make an informed choice at the polls.

Liz Hanson, NDP: As set out in my submission to the Peel River watershed land use planning commission (October 1, 2010), I do, as leader of the Yukon New Democratic Party support the draft recommended Peel watershed land use plan.

2. The parties to the Peel watershed plan (Yukon, NND, TH, VG) are expected to deliver their response(s) to the draft recommended Peel watershed plan before the end of this year. The affected First Nations have already stated publicly, and in writing to the Yukon government, that they wish to see 100% of the watershed protected. In the most recent round of public consultations, overwhelming support for 100% protection was also expressed by the public. If the Peel planning commission’s final recommended plan includes protecting the entire watershed, what factors would a government led by your party consider in deciding whether to accept the commission’s recommendations?

Mike Nixon, Yukon Party: The Peel watershed planning commission itself in releasing its recommended plan on December 2, 2009, stated that responses to its draft plan “made clear that the conflicting visions of the Peel planning region were intractable” and there were “starkly drawn conflicts over how to manage land and resources in the planning region.” Your statement that “overwhelming support for 100% protection was also expressed by the public” is misleading in that it ignores the fact that Yukoners appear to be sharply divided on how to manage land and resources in the region as stated by the Peel watershed planning commission.

One of the key objectives of Chapter 11-Land Use Planning of the Umbrella Final Agreement is: “to minimize actual or potential land use conflicts both within settlement land and non-settlement land and between settlement land and non-settlement land.” A major challenge facing every regional land use planning commission therefore is to reduce “conflicts” rather than create them and all parties (Yukon, NND, TH, VG) have agreed to meeting this objective.

The government of Yukon and four affected First Nations will each share their views on the Peel recommended plan prior to the next senior liaison committee meeting tentatively set for mid-December.

The government of Yukon, after consultation with the four First Nations and affected Yukon communities, shall approve, reject or propose modifications to that part of the recommended land use plan applying on non-settlement land which amounts to 97.3% of the planning area. The remaining 2.7% of the planning area is settlement land that is the responsibility of First Nations.

Factors that the Yukon Party government will be considering in approving, rejecting or proposing modifications will include such matters as: consistency with First Nation final agreements; surface access; the precautionary principle; and ecological values, conservation and protection.

Kirk Cameron, Liberal Party: Given the current government’s unwillingness to have discussions with the affected First Nations I seriously doubt the parties will respond to the plan before the end of the year. If any substantial changes are made to the current plan, all factors that led to that change will need to be given careful consideration. The government of Yukon will also have to go back to the public again for their views on a different plan. This is the type of leadership that is required from the government of Yukon.

Liz Hanson, NDP: An enormous amount of work has been done over the past 6 years by many people from all walks of life to develop the Peel River watershed land use plan. The plan was put together after extensive, multi-year consultation and, after amassing a vast amount of scientific, geological, economic, socio-cultural and other data.

An important realization for me as I read the plan was that although the land use planning commission relied upon many experts from many fields, the final recommendations were made with a commitment to a basic, commonsense approach that is profound. Yukoners are asked to respond to the plan not based on their “labels” i.e. miners, environmentalists, tourism operators or politicians but as parents. The challenge put to Yukoners is to “consider how you would explain the decision you take in response to the recommendations made by the commission to your grandchildren.”

I can understand the desire of many to see the entire area receive 100% protection, however I believe it is important for all parties to respect the planning process and the outcomes of that process.

3. The Peel watershed planning process has now gone on for about 6 years, and has included a number of public consultations. Would a government led by your party move the Peel planning process forward by making a decision about the future of the watershed soon and beginning work on implementation with the affected First Nations?

Mike Nixon, Yukon Party: In my opinion, the Yukon Party government is moving the progress forward in accordance with the process outlined in Chapter 11 of the UFA. The First Nation governments have to follow the same process. The Yukon government and four affected First Nations will each share their views on the recommended Peel plan prior to the senior liaison committee meeting tentatively set for mid-December.

If the Yukon government or the First Nation governments for their respective planning areas reject or propose modifications to the recommended Peel plan, they will forward either the proposed modifications with written reasons, or written reasons for rejecting the recommended Peel plan to the Peel watershed planning commission.

The Peel watershed planning commission shall then reconsider the plan and make a final recommendation for the Peel plan to the government of Yukon and the First Nation governments.

The Yukon government and the First Nation governments shall then approve, reject or modify that part of the Peel plan that applies respectively to lands under their respective jurisdictions, the 97.3% of the planning area that is non-settlement land in the case of the Yukon government and the 2.7% of the planning area that is settlement land in the case of the four First Nations. The four First Nations have already indicated that they will be proposing a modification to the recommended Peel plan changing the protection from 80% to 100% protection. The Yukon government has to consult with the four affected First Nations and affected Yukon communities should they approve, reject or modify the Peel plan and the First Nations have to consult with the Yukon government on their respective positions.

This process is binding on all parties, however, the Yukon government would like to proceed as expeditiously as possible.

Kirk Cameron, Liberal Party: Yes. It is important that we give everyone clarity on this matter as soon as possible.

Liz Hanson, NDP: Yes, a Yukon NDP government would immediately begin working with the affected First Nations to implement the Peel River watershed land use plan.

4. The moratorium on new mineral staking and oil and gas rights issuance in the Peel watershed will expire on February 4, 2011. Do you and your party support a renewal of the moratorium until the Peel planning process is finished, and a decision has been made about the future of the Peel watershed.

Mike Nixon, Yukon Party: I think it would be logical to assume that the Yukon government would extend the current interim withdrawal measures until such time as the Peel planning process has been completed. I would support that initiative.

Kirk Cameron, Liberal Party: Yes. This is again a reason why it is important to reach a conclusion to the process as soon as possible, as the moratorium sends mixed messages to everyone with a stake in the outcome.

Liz Hanson, NDP: Yes. The Yukon NDP called for a moratorium on new mineral staking and oil and gas issuances in the Peel watershed. The Yukon Party’s failure to do so resulted in a staking rush with an additional 8,000 claims being staked in the region in a very short time.

The Yukon NDP has also called upon the Yukon Party government to initiate a public process, similar to what has already occurred in B.C. and Alberta to address issues such as the principles that would guide a compensation regime should government decide that, in certain instances, public uses of land take precedence over existing mineral exploration claims.

Yukon byelection candidates quizzed on Peel

2010-12-04T17:33:00.000-08:00

The Yukon Conservation Society and CPAWS-Yukon have asked the three candidates running in the Whitehorse Centre Dec. 13 byelection where they stand on the Peel watershed issue.

NDP leader Liz Hanson is facing off against the Liberal’s Kirk Cameron and Mike Nixon, of the Yukon Party, to represent the downtown riding left vacant earlier this year by the death of NDP MLA Todd Hardy.

The recommended Peel land use plan was released a year ago. The commission is now waiting to receive the Yukon and First Nation governments’ response so it can then produce a final recommended plan.

Here are the questions posed by the two groups:

1. Do you and your party support the Peel planning commission’s draft recommended Peel watershed land use plan, which recommends protection for just over 80 per cent of the Peel watershed?

2. The parties to the Peel watershed plan (Yukon, Na-cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Vuntut Gwitchin) are expected to deliver their response(s) to the draft recommended Peel watershed plan before the end of this year.

The affected First Nations have already stated publicly, and in writing to the Yukon government, that they wish to see 100 per cent of the watershed protected. In the most recent round of public consultations, overwhelming support for 100 per cent protection was also expressed by the public.

If the Peel planning commission’s final recommended plan includes protecting the entire watershed, what factors would a government led by your party consider in deciding whether to accept the commission’s recommendations?

3. The Peel watershed planning process has now gone on for about six years, and has included a number of public consultations.

Would a government led by your party move the Peel planning process forward by making a decision about the future of the watershed soon and beginning work on implementation with the affected First Nations?

4. The moratorium on new mineral staking and oil and gas rights issuance in the Peel watershed will expire on Feb. 4, 2011.

Do you and your party support a renewal of the moratorium until the Peel planning process is finished, and a decision has been made about the future of the Peel watershed?

The candidates have been asked to respond by Dec. 6.

Ill-fated Lost Patrol marks 100th anniversary

2010-11-29T16:02:00.000-08:00

A sturdy white cross stands guard over the graves of the Lost Patrol.

LOWER PEEL RIVER
Twenty-one below. Wednesday, December 21, 1910 – Strong N. wind, with heavy mist and light snow. Left Fort McPherson at 7:45 a.m. Nooned two spells up river and camped in Indian cabin 15 miles up river. Going very heavy in some places. 15 miles.

So wrote Inspector Frank Fitzgerald on Day One of the infamous Lost Patrol.

Bound for Dawson City, his Royal North West Mounted Police patrol included two constables in their late 20s, George Kinney and Richard Taylor, and retired Mountie, 41-year-old Sam Carter. Three five-dog teams pulled their supplies.

The 475-mile journey followed the traditional route through the heart of the Peel watershed. It was expected to take no more than 30 days. But fate had other plans.

LITTLE WIND RIVER HEADWATERS
Twenty-three below. Tuesday, January 17, 1911. – Fine in a.m., with strong S.W. wind which turned to a gale in evening. Did not break camp, sent Carter and Kinney off at 7:15 a.m. to follow a river going south by a little east; they returned at 3:30 p.m., and reported that it ran right up in the mountains, and Carter said it was not the right river. I left at 8 a.m. and followed a river running south, but could not see any cuttings on it. Carter is completely lost and does not know one river from another.
We have now only 10 pounds of flour and 8 pounds of bacon and some dried fish. My last hope is gone, and the only thing I can do is to return [to McPherson], and kill some of the dogs to feed the others and ourselves, unless we can meet some Indians.
We have now been a week looking for a river to take us over the divide, but there are dozens of rivers and I am at a loss. I should not have taken Carter’s word that he knew the way from Little Wind River.

Still plagued by the brutal conditions that had hammered them from the start – cold temperatures in the extreme, deep and heavy snow and bone-chilling Arctic winds – they now had to add hunger, fatigue and frostbite to the daily challenges as they returned to McPherson.

NEAR CARIBOU BORN MOUNTAIN
Twenty-six below. Friday, February 3, 1911. – Misty in a.m., clear in p.m. Strong N.E. wind. Left camp at 7:45, crossed the mountain by 1:30 p.m. and camped on Trail creek at the mouth of the small creek. Killed another dog tonight, and had to feed some of it to the dogs as we have no dried fish. Men and dogs very thin and weak, and cannot travel far. We have travelled about 200 miles on dog meat and have still about 100 miles to go, but I think we will make it all right, but will have only three or four dogs left. 14 miles.

LOWER TRAIL RIVER
Forty-eight below. Saturday, February 5, 1911. – Fine with strong S.E. wind. Left camp at 7:15 a.m.; nooned one hour, and camped about eight miles further down [Trail River]. Just after noon I broke through the ice and had to make fire; found one foot slightly frozen. Killed another dog tonight; have only five dogs now, and can only go a few miles a day; everybody breaking out on the body and skin peeling off. 8 miles.

That was his last journal entry, but it wasn't the last of the patrol's travels.They struggled on for another three to seven days before they could struggle no more.

The bodies of Kinney and Taylor were found at a camp on the Peel River, only about 35 miles from McPherson. Taylor had blown his head off. Fitzgerald and Carter made it another 10 miles before dropping dead from starvation and exhaustion.

It was more than a month before Corporal Jack Dempster’s search patrol made the gruesome discovery. The bodies were then taken to McPherson where they were buried in a mass grave on March 28.

“The epic battle of the four Mounties to stay alive when hope was all but gone has become a fixture in northern lore,” writes Yukon author Dick North in his excellent book, The Lost Patrol.

Their biggest mistake – failing to hire a First Nations guide/hunter as all previous patrols had done before. Even when given a second chance to hire Esau George - who helped them out just days into the trip when they first got lost on the Trail River -Fitzgerald chose not to.

Instead, he decided to rely on Carter, the only one of the four who had been over the Little Wind-Forrest Creek route before. But that had only been once, four years earlier, and in the opposite direction. They had a map, but it apparently lacked sufficient detail.

When it came to food, many said they didn't have enough from the start nor were they properly equipped to feed themselves from the land. They also waited too long to turn back.

“But in the end, perhaps those were just symptoms,” writes North. “The real cause of the tragedy of the Lost Patrol may have been due to the fierce pride of its leader, Frank Fitzgerald. For him, a veteran of the Arctic, to find himself lost, unable to follow a well-established route of travel, would be difficult to accept. To have to return to Fort McPherson, with the prospect of informing his superiors that he could not find the way, would be a bitter blow. The decision to retreat would be taken with the greatest reluctance. This reluctance would have rendered his judgment and his timing faulty, and brought about the fatal consequences.”

The decisions made by the patrol will likely come under scrutiny again as northerners mark its 100th anniversary this winter.

The mass grave – now covered with cement, roped off with chain and guarded by a tall, white cross – has been spiffed up for the occasion, say Fort McPherson RCMP.

A memorial service and feast will be held on Dec. 21 to commemorate the day the patrol left McPherson for Dawson 100 years ago. A trip up the Peel to visit the two camps where the men were discovered is being planned for March.

Yukon gov't pulls plug on Peel meetings

2010-11-19T13:04:00.000-08:00

The Tr’ondek Hwech’in and Na-cho Nyak Dun First Nations are frustrated with the Yukon government and its delay tactics when it comes to dealing with the Peel.

This week Chiefs Eddie Taylor and Simon Mervyn came to Whitehorse to meet with two powerful cabinet ministers on the Peel, an issue of “great import” to their people.

But when the chiefs arrived at the office of Energy, Mines and Resources Minister Patrick Rouble, at 9 a.m. on Nov. 18 as scheduled, they were told Rouble was “too busy” to see them.

Their meeting with Community Services Minister Archie Lang, set for later the same day, was also cancelled on short notice.

“We are insulted,” said Chief Mervyn in a joint news release issued later the same day.

“We called this meeting with Minister Rouble because Yukon has not sent us their position on the Peel watershed recommended plan as per their written agreement. We cannot begin intergovernmental consultations without knowing where Yukon is coming from,” he said.

“We are concerned that the Yukon Party government is stalling because the public consultations were so strongly in favour of protecting the Peel.”

The recommended plan says 80 per cent of the watershed should be protected from industrial activity. That’s less than the 100 per cent called for by theTr’ondek Hwech’in, Na-cho Nyak Dun, Vuntut Gwitchin and Tetlit Gwich’in. But it's much more than the pro-development Yukon government is angling for.

The five governments had agreed to formally respond to the plan by Dec. 15. They can accept it, reject it, or ask for modifications.

The First Nations sent their position on the plan to the government three weeks ago, but it's clear the government has no intention of meeting that deadline.

“We asked the Yukon government to provide its position on the Peel recommended plan because intergovernmental consultations were supposed to be happening as we speak,” said Chief Taylor in the release.

“But Yukon has not responded and now appears unwilling to meet with us. We have a joint agreement with Yukon and scheduled dates for this process and the Yukon Party government is not stepping up to the plate.”

Related stories:
Time to lift the fog of doubt Yukon News Nov. 26, 2010
Chiefs slighted by ministers Yukon News Nov. 19, 2010

Read the public's lips: Protect the Peel

2010-11-10T12:23:00.000-08:00

The people have spoken. The message is clear. Protect the Peel watershed.

More than 85 per cent of about 1,450 individuals, businesses, boards and organizations that responded during recent consultations on the Peel land use plan want the region protected from industrial development.

About 450 people attended one of eight community events. Of the 100 or so people who spoke up at the meetings, only a handful opposed large-scale protection.

Ditto for comments posted to the Yukon government’s consultation website.

All but 15 of the 135 respondents who answered one or more of the 32 questions on the Peel questionnaire favoured protection.

Another 165 individuals, businesses and organizations submitted written comments. About 35 were against protection.

Three petitions were also submitted - two in support of protection, with nearly 1,000 signatures between them, and one against that was signed by 26 people.

In addition, 50 posters drawn by Fort McPherson students in support of protection were also submitted. But instead of being posted on the “documents” page along with the other submissions, they have been buried at the bottom of the “events” page.

Nineteen comments were also written on wall maps supplied at the meetings - 18 calling for protection - but they were unsigned so it's impossible to tell how many people they represent.

In all, 22 local and national organizations voiced an opinion on the land use plan. Thirteen supported protection while the rest – mostly mining and oil industry groups – pushed to open the Peel to industrial development.

About 20 businesses - tourism, mining and oil/gas companies – submitted comments. They were split down the middle, along industry lines, between pro- and anti-protection.

The Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, which conducted the consultations, has crunched the numbers a little differently.

According to its calculations, it received 1,090 submissions - 897 responses to its web quiz (it’s counting each answer to each of the 32 questions as an individual response) plus 193 documents, including eight meeting transcripts, two map-comment lists, multiple submissions by several groups and petitions.

The government has counted the 843-name pro-protection petition as just one submission, the 139-name First Nations’- support petition as six, and the Yukon Chamber of Mines’ 26-name petition as 10. And its tally doesn't include the McPherson students' posters.

By way of providing a post-consultation summary, it has reworked the questionnaire comments already available on the site into a second document that groups them geographically - inside the Yukon, inside Canada or outside Canada. To further confuse things, it has rearranged the subject order, now listing the "themes" alphabetically.

Funny thing is no matter how you cut the numbers or arrange the comments, the result remains the same: overwhelming support for protection from a broad range of individuals, companies, groups and boards.

The question now is whether the staunchly anti-protection government of Dennis Fentie and his Yukon Party will listen.

To ignore the results would destroy what little confidence remains in this secretive, debt-ridden and environmentally-unfriendly government. It would also make a mockery of the long and costly land-use planning process that so many have taken part in in good faith.

Time will soon tell if the government can propel itself past the Peel denial phase, where it has steadfastly wallowed since taking office in 2002. Officially it’s promised to reach a deal on the Peel with the Na-cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Gwich’in Tribal Council and Vuntut Gwitchin by December.

Wanted: a mineral claim compensation policy

2010-10-06T14:16:00.000-07:00

The Yukon government should start working on a plan to compensate mineral claim holders in the Peel watershed instead of making “inflammatory statements” about potential lawsuits, NDP MLA Steve Cardiff says.

Last week Economic Development Minister Jim Kenyon said mineral exploration companies will line up to sue if the Peel is protected.

Health and Social Services Minister Glenn Hart went a step further, saying tourism companies should have to pay more taxes if they want areas to remain as wilderness.

“I found their comments about the existing mineral claims in the Peel watershed and our options for dealing with them to be uninformed, irresponsible and very unproductive,” Cardiff said in the legislature Oct. 5.

“Rather than trying to frighten people, this government should be showing leadership by initiating a debate, seeking advice, developing a coherent and principled approach for compensating the holders of mineral claims,” he said.

“Instead of raising the spectre of litigation, it should be fostering a public dialogue on how we can balance the expectations of the mining industry with the expectations of Yukoners, and that the decisions made about where and when mining occurs are done in a 21st century context.”

Both B.C. and Alberta have had regulations in place for more than a decade, said Cardiff. When a B.C. commission looked at the claim compensation issue, it said a line had to be drawn between exploration properties and advanced properties.

Neither Kenyon and Hart chose to explain their remarks, leaving Energy, Mines and Resources Minister Patrick Rouble to fend off the query. First he deflected to the land use planning process and the Umbrella Final Agreement and then went on to talk about what the government wants in a plan.

“We will work collaboratively toward a final plan that incorporates a variety of land use activities within the Peel watershed and addresses the interests of the parties in a balanced manner,” Rouble said.

(Translation: a “variety of activities” means industrial development such as mining and oil/gas work and a “balance” means little or no true protection.)

He also raised the issue of thresholds, but pretended it was Cardiff who had brought it up which he had not.

Thresholds are “a point where an indicator is reaching, or has reached, a level such that undesired impacts to ecological, social/cultural, or economic resources may begin to occur,” according to the Peel land use plan.

Said Rouble: “I appreciate that the member opposite has brought up thresholds because that is an important point that all Yukoners should consider. Even in the area where we don’t have specific land use plans, we still have those thresholds for development. That’s addressed in our YESAA process, which does look at the different thresholds of activity.”

There are about 8,200 active mineral claims in the Peel – most were staked after land use planning was well underway. There are also 525 iron leases, five coal exploration licences and four oil/gas exploration permits.

What the Yukon gov't really thinks about Peel

2010-10-02T12:57:00.000-07:00

Throughout consultation on the Peel watershed land use plan, the Yukon government has insisted it is neutral on the debate. But on Sept. 28, it unleashed two ministers in the legislature to start sending out its message.

Economic Development Minister Jim Kenyon
“Another argument that came up in the last couple of speeches is the idea of economic development in the Yukon being the result of mineral activity. Well, I will remind people of previous years — mineral activity is based on several factors. First of all, availability of land or access to the land — can they explore and make their mining decisions? Do they have certainty and they can develop that according to all established regulations, all established guidelines, all established environmental concerns — wherever in the world these companies come from? They have to know that they are going to invest in something that they will have in the future.

"The Yukon protected areas strategy was horribly, horrible flawed, because it gave the government the ability to go in and say, 'We like this area; we’re going to drop a park on it.' Who in their right mind would invest in mining exploration or development in an area knowing full that the likelihood of having a mine dropped on you is pretty good actually?

"When we were first elected in 2002, that was a situation we had to get involved in quickly because there was in fact a park dropped on some mining claims. Bring that to the current day, nobody’s arguing that there are areas that need to be protected. That’s absolutely a necessity, but bring that into today by drawing a huge circle in the centre of the map and saying that’s the Peel region and we want to protect it 100 percent. Well, I draw to people who hold that — and I don’t disagree with the fact that there are areas — but to draw a circle and say that whole area is going to be protected.

"In this case, there are 2,700 mineral claims — many of them pre-existing for many years. What are you going to do when the lineup starts at the courthouse and the lawsuits start flying, when the government has to start laying out huge sums of money in embarrassment then try to settle these things out?

"In my own profession, we have the saying: 'No money, no medicine'. Well, to a large degree, that’s a variation on this, which says, 'No money, no environment.'

"Without the economic activity and the ability to invest in the environment and to really look at that, you’ve got a really big problem. The other aspect of that, in terms of mineral activity, the mineral activity is also, and correctly so, based on world mineral prices. Now think about that. The mineral prices are the same anywhere in the world. If you are selling that ounce of gold here, or you’re selling it in Brazil, the price is the same. Why did we go from somewhere, I believe in the 1970s, in terms of a reasonable place to invest for mining, to number four last year? We’re fourth best in the world to look at, and to invest in. Why, in the early years, after our election, were we showing improvements in the range of sixteen times — 1,600 percent better than the Canadian national average, with the same mineral prices? It’s philosophy and that’s a huge part of it.

"I don’t want anyone to get the wrong idea in the Peel. Obviously it should be protected. In many areas, it should be properly evaluated. We are obligated by the Umbrella Final Agreement and other agreements to follow a process, and we are committed to follow that process.

"We can’t go out with a magic wand — ain’t got one. I wish I did some days, but I don’t. Nobody on this side does, and I would suggest that no one on the other side does either — as much as they’d like to think that they do. What would they do with all of these potential lawsuits that are out there? There is a demonstrated need to react on that issue, but the demonstrated need isn’t dictated by shooting yourself in the foot and continually reloading. That doesn’t make sense."

Health Minister Glenn Hart
“The member opposite brought up an interesting comment when he talked about trying to come up with a value for the pristine wilderness and how he’s going to do that — very interesting. He talks about protection of the environment against mining, and then we’re going to talk about the pristine environment and that it should have a value.

"Well, if you’re going to have a value for that pristine environment, then the people who use that pristine environment will have to be taxed accordingly, using the same analogy the member opposite used. In other words, the wilderness operators and the outfitters are all going to have to take the same kind of responsibility in using that pristine wilderness. They are using that pristine wilderness.”

NOTE: Currently there are actually about 8,200 quartz claims and 525 iron leases in the Peel watershed.

See related story:
Ministers talk taxes, lawsuits if wilderness users win Peel debate
(Whitehorse Star, Sept. 30, 2010)

Peel protection touted at Mayo meeting

2010-10-01T17:51:00.000-07:00

An abandoned exploration site in the Peel watershed.

MAYO – When Frank Patterson was only 18, he went by horseback into the Peel with his friend, Jimmy Johnny.

It changed his life.

“I was troubled but that four months that I spent out there – I came back with a different perspective. It took me a long way,” Patterson told more than 50 people who came out to a public meeting on the Peel plan on Sept. 29.

“It was the best time in my life that I’ve ever had,” he said.

In addition to his fond memories, Patterson, now chair of the Mayo Renewable Resources Council, also remembers seeing abandoned mineral exploration sites left for the taxpayers to clean up.

Many of these old sites are still there, said Jimmy Johnny, who has been guiding in the upper Peel since 1958.

“It doesn’t matter how much money the mining and exploration companies bring into the Yukon, what matters is the water, the fish, the people,” Johnny told the hometown crowd.

Na-cho Nyak Dun Elder Bella Peter described what she found at the abandoned Hart River mine site when she arrived there to cook several years ago for a crew trying to clean it up.

“Whoever run that mine there, they left everything there. It was just a mess. I don’t know how many trailers were there. And the gas tank. One old truck. One old grader. And the kitchen – they had a little kitchen there and it was just a mess,” said Peter.

“That’s why we don’t want any miner to go out and cut any ground,” she said, adding there’s more to consider than just “gold, gold, gold, gold.”

Mayo resident Susan Stuart said gold has been a “four-letter word” for thousands of years.

“We’ve stolen, we’ve killed, we’ve raped and pillaged, we’ve done all those wonderful things for the pretty yellow stuff,” she said.

The Na-cho Nyak Dun is pushing for 100 per cent of the watershed to be protected, and she thanked the First Nation for taking that stand.

Hunting outfitter Alan Young, who operates in the Wind and Hart River region, said Yukoners need to realize that there are not many large wilderness areas left in North America.

If it’s left as it is it will be even more valuable, he said.

“I see canoers, rafters, hikers, hunters – all kinds of people….And you know what? You cannot see where they were yesterday,” said Young. “They are leaving no impact on this land it’s sustainable.”

Na-cho Nyak Dun Chief Simon Mervyn says the land, air and water – or the LAW as he likes to call the trio – need to be given top priority.

He also presented Yukon government officials with a petition signed by people from around the Yukon, calling on Premier Dennis Fentie to protect the Peel.

The only person who spoke against protection in the Peel was self-employed Yukon geologist Clive Asphinault.

The recommended plan – which protects 80 per cent of the watershed – is neither fair nor balanced, he said.

However he didn’t say what percentage, if any, he would consider acceptable.

The mining industry brings millions of dollars to the territory, and he’s afraid that will dry up if the Peel is protected.

This was the last of eight community meetings held by the Yukon government on the Peel land use plan.

It hopes to work out a formal response to the plan, along with the four affected First Nations, before the end of the year.

Fort McPherson calls for 100% protection

2010-09-22T20:17:00.000-07:00

Elder Charlie Snowshoe quizzed government officials at Peel meeting.

FORT MCPHERSON – Tetlit Gwich’in elder Robert Alexie has travelled to places in the Peel that most people have only heard about.

Raised on the Trail River, he’s been up the Hart, Wind, Blackstone and Ogilvie Rivers – sometimes by dogteam, sometimes on foot.

In more recent years, he’s returned to some of those places again, by raft and snowmobile, to share them with young people from his community of 800, perched on the banks of the lower Peel River.

“As I travel around I can see where my people have been - you know that’s given me a lot of power, “ Alexie told more than 50 people packed into the Peel consultation meeting Tuesday.

But when he looks at the map in the recommended Peel land use plan, he can’t understand why some places he thinks are important – like the Blackstone and Ogilvie Rivers - have been left open for industrial development.

Alexie thinks they should also be protected along with the rest of the watershed.

“If we leave that alone, if it’s protected, our people will be wealthy for the rest of their lives,” Alexie said.

Everyone who spoke - from elders to newly-elected Tetlit Gwich’in chief William Koe to grade school children, whose “protect the Peel” posters lined the meeting room walls - delivered the same message.

“Our ancestors protected it [the Peel] for many years and they looked after it and now it’s our turn,” Koe told Yukon government officials and the standing-room-only crowd.

Whatever happens in the upper Peel affects everything and everybody downstream, he reminded them.

Just look at northern Alberta, where deformed fish with large tumors or no fins, are being pulled from the waters downriver from the massive oilsand developments.

“We hear about the Athabasca River, oilsands, poison leaking into the rivers,” said elder Mary Teya. “Pollution is killing their fish, affecting their water, affecting their people - diseases of different types. “

The Peel needs 100 per cent protection to ensure its water and its people don’t suffer a similar fate, she said.

“I can’t sit back and say nothing. I can’t sit back and think it’s okay. I’m not letting it go by any more,” Teya said. “I’m in my old age now and I need to speak up on behalf of my people.”

Bertha Francis was born in the mountains of the upper Peel when the region was still part of her people’s annual trek between winter hunting grounds and summer fishing camps .

“I feel as though I belong there and that land belongs to me,” she said. “We want 100 per cent protection and we want you people to know that.”

Eighty-year-old Jane Charlie would love to see the entire watershed protected. The Bonnetplume River is named after her grandfather, Andrew Bonnetplume, and she grew up on stories about her people travelling the region, sometimes in large mooseskin boats.

But she’s a little skeptical.

She’s seen many government consultation teams come and go and they're all the same.

They sit and listen, and then “walk out and forget” all they’ve heard, she said, her young grandson at her side.

“I wonder if they’re going to listen to us,” Charlie said. “This time I hope something happens.”

Charlie Snowshoe is still trying to get a straight answer to why thousands of mineral claims were staked after the planning commission began its work.

He first asked about them two weeks ago at the Inuvik consultation meeting but didn't have much luck. This time around he didn’t fare much better.

Yukon land use planner Jen Meurer told him all five governments - Yukon, Na-cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Gwich’in Tribal Council and Vuntut Gwitchin – agreed to let staking continue while the plan was developed.

“If you look at the terms of reference on the planning commission, all five parties to the planning process agreed to those terms during the planning process,” she said.

But the terms of reference – which can be found in Chapter One of the recommended Peel plan – make no mention of mineral staking or any such agreement.

Infact the commission asked for a staking ban while it did its work, but the request was refused by the Yukon government.

Gwich’in Tribal Council president Richard Nerysoo used the McPherson meeting to update the community about his group’s political position on the Peel.

He assured those in attendance the council supports protecting 100 per cent of the region from industrial development.

But, he said, it still needs to figure out if that should include other types of development. It also needs to decide what type of designation – a park, a refuge or whatever - would work best for the area.

“The position of the leadership is we want 100 per cent protection - the issue is what is the protection we are talking about,” Nerysoo said.

The last community consultation meeting is scheduled for Mayo on Sept. 29. The public can submit comments on the recommended land use plan until Oct. 1.

Peel protection gathers momentum at Whitehorse consultation meeting

2010-09-17T10:57:00.000-07:00

RESOURCE INDUSTRY RELIC - An old oil well on the Peel River.

Joe Tetlichi has spent a good part of his life on the Peel River.

He's watched the resource industry come and he's watched the resource industry go.

“Too many times industry has tried and did develop areas and then walked away,” Tetlichi said during a public meeting on the Peel land use plan in Whitehorse this week.

He doesn't want to ever watch that happen again.

“We don’t believe that money is the almighty. We believe that protection of the land and the water and the air is more important,” Tetlichi told the crowd of more than 150.

“I don’t believe that development and my traditional cultural activities can co-exist. I do not believe that. I want to see those rivers clear, clean and flowing, same quantity and quality, for the rest of my life – that’s what is important to me.”

Tetlichi was one of about 20 speakers who lined up to tell the Yukon government they want 100 per cent of the Peel protected from industrial development.

Mayo elder Jimmy Johnny, who has been guiding in the southern Peel for more than 50 years, also talked about the aftermath of mineral exploration.

An exploration camp near the confluence of Goz Creek and the Bonnetplume River was littered with old fuel drums and other debris after the company pulled up stakes, Johnny said. Some of those barrels eventually ended up in the river.

He’s also seen camps and drill sites set up far too close to mineral licks, with no regard to the impact on the sheep, caribou and moose that use them, he said.

Yukon educator Bob Sharp, who has paddled nearly all of the navigable rivers in the watershed, questioned the very premise that mining is good for the territory’s economy.

A 1967 study showed that many other sectors produced a far greater rate of return, he said.

“The presumption – undemonstrated - that mining works for the Yukon is just not the case,” said Sharp. “We haven’t seen a demonstration of that and there’s substantial evidence to say that just ain’t so.”

The Faro mine is a classic example, he said. “We’ll be paying for centuries to come for the damage that was done there. We’re going to pay more for the recovery than was ever taken out of the ground.”

The Yukon has nothing to lose if it decides to protect the Peel watershed, said Whitehorse resident Keith Lay.

Decades of mineral exploration in the region have not produced a single mine, he pointed out.

“We don’t need it. We could shut it down entirely and it is not going to have any impact on us,” Lay said. “Perhaps we should give eco-tourism 80 years to see what they could do with the area.”

As far as John Streicker is concerned, the land use planning process itself is just too long and too complex.

It’s clear most Yukoners want the Peel protected so the government should just move ahead with that, he said.

“I sometimes wonder if we had closed this process off a little sooner whether we could have taken all the money that we didn’t have to spend on the plan and put it towards compensating for the claims that will likely need to be extinguished,“ Streicker said.

Whitehorse resident Mike Richards, who also supports protecting the Peel, said it’s time to reconsider our “more, more, more” society.

“We don’t need it all. We don’t need to stake the entire world. Infact I would have loved this process to have been in the reverse where we actually have to have consultation to open new mines.”

Only a couple of people spoke against protection.

Prospector Bob Scott said the fight over the Peel watershed is filled with emotion that prevents people from recognizing the economic benefits mining can bring.

Mining should be able to take place in the Peel along with everything else, he said.

Yukon Chamber of Mines president Carl Schulze said regulations can ensure responsible mineral exploration, an industry that is needed to stoke the economy.

“We have to be able to generate enough wealth to keep our current standard of living high,” he said. “Because if it goes down, it’s not like we’re all going to live a lot nicer. If it goes down, we’re all going to suffer. “

His organization and the Yukon Chamber of Commerce were the only two stakeholder groups to make presentations opposing protection.

The Tourism Industry Association, the Wilderness Tourism Association of the Yukon, the Yukon Conservation Society and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society all urged the government to protect the region.

The next public meetings are scheduled for Fort McPherson and Tsiigehtchic on Sept. 21. There will also be one in Mayo on Sept. 29.

See related stories:
Peel planning drags on, frustrates stakeholders
(Yukon News, Sept. 17, 2010)
Extend Peel moratorium: Yukon grand chief
(Peel Watershed News, Sept. 16, 2010)
Protecting the Peel region strongly urged
(Whitehorse Star, Sept. 16, 2010)
Peel watershed debate heats up in Whitehorse
(CBC.CA Sept. 16, 2010)

Extend Peel moratorium: Yukon grand chief

2010-09-16T10:55:00.000-07:00

No more industrial activity should be allowed in the Peel region until a land use plan has been finalized, Council of Yukon First Nations grand chief Ruth Massie says.

"I call upon the Yukon government and the premier [Dennis Fentie] to respect our agreements and the relationship of our governments, which he publically speaks is a healthy partnership,” Massie told more than 150 people crammed into a Whitehorse meeting room to talk about the Peel on Wednesday.

“We call on him to do the right thing. We ask for a moratorium on any activity in the Peel River watershed area until the land use planning process is complete,” she said.

When work first started on the land use plan in late 2004, the Yukon government was asked to impose a moratorium but it refused, saying land use planning and resource development could take place at the same time.

As a result, mineral exploration companies rushed into the area and staked thousands of new claims. New coal and oil/gas permits were also issued.

Not only was the Peel planning commission forced to deal with the ever-changing landscape, it was also stuck with the new claims and permits. The government said it would not expropriate or compensate to make way for protection.

It wasn’t until after the proposed land use plan was released last December – a plan that had to “grandfather in” all existing claims and permits - that the government finally agreed to a one-year staking ban.

Even then, a few weeks later it issued a “relief order” to ensure none of the existing mineral claims would expire during the same one-year period. The order applied to about 2,400 of the 8,200 existing quartz claims. They are being automatically renewed for free for a year - no work or payment is required.

The one-year staking ban expires on Feb. 4, 2011 or in about five months from now.

But it could easily be at a year or more before a final Peel land use plan is produced.

This current round of public consultation ends on October 1. Then the five governments – Yukon, Na-cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Vuntut Gwitchin and the Gwich’in Tribal Council – have to hash out a formal response to the proposed plan.

They can either accept it, reject it or ask the Peel commission to make changes.

The commission then reconvenes to consider their response and prepare a final recommended plan.

That version will then be marched around to the communities for consultation, government officials say. Based on public and government response, a final plan will then be drawn up.

The proposed plan recommends protecting 80 per cent of the watershed, but First Nations and others are calling for 100 per cent protection.

The Council of Yukon First Nations and the national Assembly of First Nations support the push for protection of the entire watershed, Massie said.

Contaminated sites, claims top concerns

2010-09-11T18:59:00.000-07:00

INUVIK – If 90-year-old Eunice Mitchell had been given a chance to speak, she would have asked about the mess left behind by oil companies at the Peel’s Caribou River.

“I was too slow,” said the bespectacled elder with a little grin as she watched Yukon government officials tear down the maps they’d tacked to the meeting room walls for the Peel land use plan consultation Sept. 8.

But it wasn’t her fault at all – the organizers didn’t make it clear to the 15 people in attendance that the time for comments was coming to a close.

Instead the aging granny was told after the meeting that she’d get another chance to talk when the Peel roadshow arrives in her home community of Fort McPherson in two weeks time.

Even though she didn’t get to say her bit, Mitchell was still glad she came. She says it made her happy to hear people say so many good things about the Peel.

People, like James Firth, who used the Caribou River contaminated site as an illustration of how governments need to co-operate more closely if land use planning is going to work.

The Gwich’in had to fight long and hard to get some action on that site, he said.

“For over three years they were going up with shovels and garbage bags and hauling it out and that’s not acceptable,” Firth said.

Eventually it was cleaned up, but many other sites still remain.

Robert Charlie, who grew up on the Peel River and supports full protection for the watershed, says the issue of contaminated sites is part of a larger problem.

“ I don’t know who is responsible for cleaning those up but we have a land claims agreement that was settled in 1992 and part of the conditions in that document are that those sites are supposed to be cleaned up,” Charlie said.

“If that’s any indication on how that land is going to be protected, I don’t have any faith in government to take care of that land for us.”

The Yukon government should make a plan to remediate all the contaminated sites in the Peel planning area, said Norman Snowshoe.

“To ensure there is no Caribou River all over again,” he said.

Tetlit Gwich’in elder Charlie Snowshoe, who has been fighting to protect the Peel watershed since the 1980s, raised concerns about existing mineral claims.

He’s angry that most of the 8,000 or so Peel claims were staked during the land use planning process after the government refused to impose a moratorium. And he’s angry that once it finally issued a one-year staking ban last February, it then decided to automatically renew 2,400 claims, that were due to expire during the ban, for free.

“What’s going on?” asked Snowshoe point blank.

Nor can he understand why the existing claims are “grandfathered in” under the recommended plan.

“It [claim staking] shouldn’t have happened at the time they were working on the land use planning. Five years and they were still staking claims. When you classify it [now] as a grandfathered deal, that’s not right,” he said.

Yukon government planner Renee Mayes pinned the blame for the grandfathered claims on the Peel Watershed Planning Commission.

“That [grandfathering the claims] was a recommendation that the commission, an independent body, has made to the governments. The claims have a legal basis for their existence. We haven’t explored extinguishing them and I guess the commission didn’t either because they have not recommended that,” she said.

What she failed to mention was the Yukon government didn’t give the commission any choice – it said it would not expropriate any claims or compensate claimholders.

Just who owns all these claims and what does it cost them, Inuvik elder Liz Hansen wanted to know.

“The answers to those questions is available on the government of Yukon’s website,” said Mayes without giving any other details such as a web address.

After Hansen pointed out that many people don’t know how to use or have access to the internet, Mayes agreed to have the information sent to her by mail.

That’s a good thing because even for those with a computer, an internet connection and the knowledge to use them, coaxing information from the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources’ mining claims database is a major challenge.

There is no way to ask for only claims in the Peel. Without a company or claim name, conducting such a search is almost impossible. Nor does the site include any information about the money paid or work done on the claims.

Just as an aside, the controversial video, produced by the Na-cho Nyak Dun and Tr’ondek Hwech’in, was sent back down to the bottom of the agenda.

At the last meeting in Dawson City, Chief Eddie Taylor managed to persuade government officials to play the video, which provides a First Nations perspective on the Peel watershed, near the beginning where it seems to belong.

Next week the Yukon government will hold two meetings in Whitehorse – an information session on Sept. 13 and a public meeting on Sept. 15.

The following week it moves to Fort McPherson and Tsiigehtchic. The last meeting will be held in Mayo on Sept. 29. The deadline for public comments is Oct. 1.

Tombstone Park mining proposal nuked

2010-09-04T07:06:00.000-07:00

In a surprise move, the pro-mining Yukon government has sided with the environmental assessor and said no to a mining project in the middle of Tombstone Park.

The mineral resources branch decision, released Sept. 3, upholds the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board’s recommendation to reject the Canadian United Minerals proposal.

Although the government agreed the project had “significant environmental and socio-economic effects” that could not be mitigated, it didn't completely close the door to future mining in the park.

“The decision does not preclude submissions for assessment under YESAA of a redesigned project that introduces alternatives approaches,” says the decision document.

The company, owned by Whitehorse resident Joel White, wanted to drill, blast and trench on its 18 gold-uranium claims, located at the headwaters of the Blackstone River, a major tributary of the Peel.

It also wanted to build a winter trail along the river to the Dempster Highway and haul out hundreds of tonnes of “bulk ore samples” using a large, tracked snow-vehicle.

But almost everyone thought it was a bad idea. About 700 submissions were received by the assessment board on the proposal – almost all urged it to turn the project down.

The Horn claims have been controversial since they were first staked in 1997 while talks of a park were underway. By the time the park was officially established, the government refused to expropriate the claims and a legal challenge to force them out failed.

No work has been done on the claims for several years and the company’s permit to conduct work expired in May.

An old wooden shack, a broken-down backhoe, some leaking fuel drums and other miscellaneous mining gear still sit at the site.

A recent report by a government inspector said the site needs to be cleaned up – especially the fuel drums - and the trenches need to be backfilled.

Other documents show the government has had trouble getting White to clean up at the placer mine he's been operating south of Dawson City for the past 10 years.

The YESAB website has all the Tombstone mining proposal and changes, the public comments, the board's recommendation and the government decision document.

Other related stories:
Say a big N-O to mining in Tombstone Park (Peel Watershed News, June 18, 2010)
Messy miner wants to keep on digging (Yukon News, Aug. 13, 2010)

100% protection or bust

2010-08-25T17:33:00.000-07:00

DAWSON CITY – When it comes to the Peel watershed, the Tr’ondek Hwech’in want the entire region protected - no ifs, ands or buts.

Chief Eddie Taylor made that clear right off the bat at a Peel land use meeting Monday night, organized by the Yukon government’s Department of Energy, Mines and Resources.

“Our position is definitely 100 per cent protection in the Peel,” Taylor told about 30 people gathered for the consultation. “Make no mistake - the Tr’ondek position is to protect this and we are looking for support territorially and nationally.”

Just to make doubly sure his message was heard, he insisted that an eight-minute Peel video, produced by his First Nation and the Na-cho Nyak Dun, be catapulted from the bottom of the agenda to the top.

The plan, released by the Peel Watershed Planning Commission last December, recommends 80 per cent of the region be protected. The 20 per cent left open to industrial development – mostly around the Blackstone River and Dempster Highway – is important to the Tr’ondek for land and harvesting.

Rather than carving the region up and rating its significance by features, Taylor said the plan should recognize the whole region is important for everything – water, wildlife, fish and heritage – and in need of protection.

Dawson resident Sebastian Jones said now that the public has become accustomed to the concept of 80 per cent protection, it may be time to consider greater protection.

“Perhaps it’s time to look at it again - now we realize that the world has not ended and that there hasn’t been a stampede of mining interests leaving the Yukon since the plan was recommended, “ Jones said. “On the contrary, there has been more exploration work than in the Yukon for a very long time.”

Several people raised concerns about the plan’s provision to “grandfather-in” more than 8,000 mineral claims. Most were staked during the five-year land use planning process and about 2,400 of them were recently renewed for free.

But letting the mineral claims stand is a bad move, they said. Even though the plan says no new roads would be allowed, claimholders have a legal right to access their ground under existing laws. Better to extinguish the claims to ensure true protection.

The importance of clean water was stressed by Tr’ondek elder Percy Henry. Born and raised in the Blackstone River region, he spent years travelling the area by snowshoe and dogteam, and living off the land.

“Now I’m afraid to drink the water,” he said.

Mabel Henry echoed his concerns, pointing to the demise of the Yukon River as an example: “I remember drinking Yukon water - now you can’t even do laundry in it.”

Polluted water is just one problem facing northern Alberta First Nations who are grappling with rapid tar sands development, said Gladys Netro, a Vuntut Gwitchin whose home is in the Ogilvie River region.

“For them, they thought they had no recourse. There is no turning back, it’s too late,” Netro said. “We don’t have to turn out like our neighbours in Alberta, northern B.C. ….We don’t need that. We don’t want that for our future.”

Helmut Schoener, who moved to Dawson 30 years ago from West Germany, said if more people had his background there would be no argument about the future of the Peel watershed.

“To even think of selling this area out for mining would be to sell the Mona Lisa for 20 bucks,” Schoener said.

The lone opponent of the Peel plan, Helen Bowie, said she’s not against setting some land aside from mining but thinks 80 per cent is too much.

“I am a firm believer that there is room for both,” she said. “People have to make a living….I don’t think it’s a given that when people go into the country that they are destroying it.”

Chief Taylor isn’t so sure about that, given the mining industry’s short-term view which is at odds with the First Nations’ long-term vision for the land.

A recent meeting between Yukon chiefs and the Yukon Chamber of Mines showed him just how big the gulf was between the two, he said.

“It wasn’t very long into the meeting we realized that we had just a whole different way of thinking,” Taylor said.

“We identified to them that they’re worried about now - getting the resources out, worried about filling their pockets, filling their pockets with lots of money. The chiefs said: ‘We don’t think that way. We’re thinking 10 lifetimes down the road. We need this healthy water. We need these healthy animals. We need the healthy land, for 10 generations from now.’”

The Dawson meeting was the second in a series of meetings the government is holding to gauge public sentiment on the Peel plan.

During the first meeting in Old Crow the public had more questions than comments. In Dawson it was the other way around.

The next meeting is in Inuvik on Sept. 8 and then Aklavik on Sept. 9. The Whitehorse meeting is set for Sept. 15. No dates have yet been finalized for Mayo, Fort McPherson and Tsiigehtchic.

Transcripts of the meetings will be posted on the government’s peelconsultation.ca website about two weeks after they take place.

Boom in mining threatens Peel

2010-08-21T20:33:00.000-07:00

OLD CROW - With the Chinese snapping up Yukon mineral properties, the need to protect the Peel watershed from industrial development has become even greater, the chair of the North Yukon Renewable Resources Council says.

“Right now with all the mines and development happening in the Yukon, and investment, and now the Chinese are moving in, there’s even more potential for something to happen in that area,” Robert Bruce told a team of Yukon government officials at the first of a series of community meetings on the Peel land use plan held in Old Crow on Aug. 19.

The plan says 80 per cent of 68,000-square-kilometre watershed should be protected. Bruce can live with that, but he'd be happier with 100 per cent, given the need to protect the land for the caribou and the water for the fish.

And don’t even think about putting in new roads, the former MLA warned. “Once access goes through, no matter if it’s only even winter access, we’re going to be in big trouble.”

Bruce was one of about a dozen people, tightly packed into the council’s meeting room, along with five bureaucrats, an “independent” facilitator and a power point presentation - all recently arrived on a chartered aircraft from Whitehorse.

By contrast, the lone Peel watershed planning commissioner, Steve Taylor, who was invited at the last minute, had to come on the scheduled flight the day before, stay with friends and sit on the sidelines.

Taylor’s commission just spent the past five years reading the material, analyzing the information, listening to stakeholders, discussing the possibilities and producing the 350-page comprehensive Peel plan but, apparently, that doesn’t count for much now.

Too bad. When he was given a few minutes to make some opening remarks, he provided much-needed context and a little comfort in the sea of bewildering bureaucratize and land use lingo.

About an hour into the suppertime meeting, the facilitator turfed the carefully-scripted agenda because it clearly wasn’t working: nobody wanted to play “comment-by-theme.”

All attempts to corral people’s comments down the neatly-packaged “theme” chutes, failed. Rather than talk about the “conservation focus,” they wanted about to speak about roads and caribou, protection and climate change, laws and implementation.

They also had plenty of questions.

Most were handled by Jen Meurer, a land use planner with the energy, mines and resources, the department that is leading the consultation charge. Some were technical, but some went beyond into the land of policy and politics.

What about climate change? What about the caribou? How is the plan going to be implemented? Is a railway going to be built? Are there going to be new laws to give the recommendations some clout? Will no really mean no, like the Berger inquiry?

If anyone was keeping score, nobody during the three-hour meeting said the plan provided too much protection.

Most of the Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation’s traditional territory has already undergone its own land use planning exercise. The resulting North Yukon land use plan, finalized in 2009, was the first one to be signed off in the territory.

Only a small percentage of Vuntut traditional territory falls within the Peel planning region. It has a couple of pieces of land. It is also connected with the area because it's the wintering ground for the Porcupine caribou herd.

Chief Joe Linklater, who is stepping down from his post in November, said his government has not taken a position on the plan.

"We are still very carefully developing those recommendations and we will put that forward so hopefully what we learn out of today's consultation and the following consultations in other communities will help us come to a final decision on what we feel would be a good plan or would add, be positive for people, for all Yukon, in particular the northern part of the Yukon," he said.

The “tricky part” is going to be getting agreement from all four First Nations and the Yukon government on whether to accept, reject or propose modifications to the plan before sending it back to the commission, he said.

Appearing via video presentation, the chiefs of the Na-cho Nyak Dun and Tr’ondek Hwech’in made their position abundantly clear.

“We need total protection out there,” says Na-cho Nyak Dun chief Simon Mervyn in the 10-minute closing presentation. “The environment is not for sale, period.”

Tr’ondek Hwech’in chief Eddie Taylor says it’s pulling out all the stops to protect the Peel, a region his First Nation members use all the time.

“The waters up there and the land has to be protected,” Taylor says. “There’s no other way.”

Transcripts of the public meetings will be posted on the EMR peel consultation website but not until two weeks after they take place.

Click here to see The Peel Watershed: A First Nations Perspective on YouTube.

2,400 Peel claims get free renewal ride

2010-08-17T13:09:00.000-07:00

About 2,400 Peel mineral claims that were due to expire during the staking ban have been given a one-year extension – for nothing.

No $100 worth of assessment work required. No money in lieu.

The “relief” order was quietly issued by the Yukon’s mining department in late March. It applies to all claims with an expiry date between Feb. 4, 2010 and Feb. 4, 2011.

Most of the “relief” claims – about 1,375 – are registered to Toronto-based Cash Minerals, now called Pitchblack Resources. Some of them it owns with Mega Uranium and some through its takeover of Signet Minerals.

Before the order was granted, the penny stock company was letting its claims lapse when they came due. It had already let more than 2,850 run out.

To keep the 1,375 that were going to expire in 2010 and early 2011, the company would have had to pay $137,500 or do that amount of work. There’s a good chance it wouldn’t have bothered. That’s a lot of money for a financially-strapped company that packed up and left the region three years ago.

Its website, once containing reams of information about its search for uranium in the Wind and Bonnet Plume valleys, has been reduced to a single screen of contact details and a link to its financial stock exchange filings.

But, thanks to government “relief,” it retains its status as the largest claim-owner in the Peel, holding 2,493 of about 8,300 active claims.

Another beneficiary of the government’s relief is mining giant Phelps Dodge Corporation. It gets to keep its 278 claims in the McLuskey Lake area for another year without lifting a finger or paying a dime.

Others companies include Copper Ridge Explorations, Zinccorp Resources, Fronteer Gold and Archer, Cathro & Associates. All have a hundred or so claims that expire within the staking ban period.

The Yukon Chamber of Mines, which leaned on the government to issue the order, wants to see the "relief" extended even further.

“The chamber lobbied for relief for assessment filing during this period [of the staking ban] and was granted partial success; no claims will be allowed to expire during this period,” president Carl Schulze writes in the chamber’s July 2010 newsletter.

“However this relief is inadequate as the clock still ticks on assessment requirements on all other claims,” he adds.

Most of the 2,400 “relief” claims fall within the 80 per cent of the Peel slated for protection under the land use plan.

Although no new claims are allowed under the plan, existing claims would be “grandfathered in.” The Yukon government has said it will not expropriate claims nor compensate claimholders to pave the way for protection in the watershed.

It took the same position when Tombstone Park was established. The result: the current debacle over whether the miner should now be allowed to work the "grandfathered" gold/uranium claims on the upper Blackstone River and build a winter trail to access them.

Meanwhile, the government is also on the verge of renewing Chevron’s 525 iron leases in the Snake River region, for another 21 years. The current leases, which don’t run out until 2013-14, are also in an area planned for wilderness protection.

Peel watershed roadshow & other stories

2010-08-14T09:46:00.000-07:00

The first of a series of public meetings on the recommended Peel land use plan will be held in Old Crow on Aug. 19.

The Vuntut Gwitchin community of 250 is located more than 150 kilometres northwest of the watershed, but the Peel makes up a part of the First Nation’s traditional territory.

One of the main connections - the Porcupine caribou herd whose winter range includes the entire Peel watershed. Its numbers have dropped drastically from 179,000 in 1989 to 100,000 or less today.

Although the Peel land use plan protects 80 per cent of the region, the area around the Blackstone/Ogilvie Rivers and Dempster Highway – the area most used by the barrenground herd in recent years - falls within the 20 per cent left open for development.

The North Yukon region, which includes Old Crow, already has a final land use plan - the first in the territory.

The Old Crow meeting will be held from 4:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at the North Yukon Renewable Resources Council office.

The Blackstone River is not protected under the plan.

Dawson City will be the next stop for the Peel consultation roadshow. A public meeting will be held there on Aug. 23 at the Tr'ondek Hwech'in Hall. There's a drop-in session from 3 to 5 p.m. and a presentation/discussion from 7 to 9 p.m.

The Whitehorse meeting is scheduled for Sept. 15. Dates for meetings in Mayo, Fort McPherson, Tsiigehtchic, Aklavik and Inuvik have not been finalized.

This round of consultation is being led by the Yukon government, in co-ordination with the region's four First Nations. Previous consultation was conducted by the independent planning commission.

Written submissions can be posted to the Peel consultation website or sent to the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources by mail or fax. The deadline for comments is October 1.

Read all about it

One of the ragged peaks that stands guard at Duo Lakes.

The Peel's been a bit of a media magnet this summer.

Yukon journalists finally got to see some of the places they'd only written about during a three-day tour in early August.

Yukon News photo editor/videographer Mike Thomas produced a short documentary called Clash Over Paradise. His colleague, reporter James Munson, wrote a thoughtful and comprehensive feature titled Peel Watershed: you use it, you lose it and a related story, Peel commission endorsed “quasi-religious’ values.

The Whitehorse Star, CHON-FM, APTN and CBC Yukon were also on the trip, hosted by the Yukon Conservation Society and CPAWS-Yukon.

Further afield, the threat to the Peel watershed from the mining industry was also the cover story of the spring issue of Canada’s premier canoeing magazine, Kanawa. Written by Charlotte Jacklein, Wind River - Travels in a changing landscape is based on a recent trip she did in the Peel.

Canadian Geographic also zeroed in on the beleaguered watershed in July. B.C.-based writer Leslie Anthony and Yukon photographer Fritz Mueller travelled down the Snake River in search of all that makes this wilderness region tick. Their findings are due to appear in a special water-themed issue of the magazine next June.

Moving on the Peel
The beauty of the Peel’s wilderness and the struggle to protect it are the focus of a CPAWS-Yukon event at Whitehorse's Beringia Centre on Aug. 26.

Billed as an evening of entertainment and information, Moving On The Peel will feature the work of Yukon photographers Peter Mather, Robert Postma and Marten Berkman.

Tr'ondek Hwech'in Chief Eddie Taylor will talk about the First Nations' perspective on the watershed and CPAWS will provide an update on the campaign to save the Peel from industrial development.

Yukon Party drops to third place in poll

2010-08-10T12:45:00.000-07:00

The popularity of the territory’s ruling party continues its downward slide, a recent poll conducted by DataPath Systems shows.

Support among decided voters for the Yukon Party fell to 22 per cent in July, 2010 from a high of 47 per cent in early 2009, the Yukon-based polling company says in an Aug. 9 news release.

This puts the Yukon Party dead last - well behind the Liberals, which lead the pack with 39 per cent, and also the NDP with 26 per cent.

Support for both opposition parties has grown during the past year, but so has the number of undecided voters.

Thirty-nine per cent of the 349 Yukoners polled in July said they didn’t know who they’d vote for if an election were called at the time. That’s more than 2009 and well above the average of 20 per cent.

With so many undecided voters, it’s hard to predict how an election would turn out today, says DataPath pollster Donna Larsen in the release, aptly titled The Summer of Disconnect.

“Typically undecided voters either don’t vote, or they vote in similar patterns to the decided voters, so polls are a good indication of election results. However, with so many undecided voters, the trends become more important than the actual percentages,” says the release.

When asked about the most pressing issues, poor governance continued to top the list of those polled. The environment came in second, ahead of the economy and social issues.

Yukon Premier Dennis Fentie has to call a general election by the fall of 2011.

There is some speculation he may go to the polls sooner than that to avoid a by-election in Whitehorse Centre and a leadership review he promised disgruntled Yukon Party members last May.

A by-election to replace NDP MLA Todd Hardy, who recently died after a lengthy battle with cancer, has to be held by January unless a general election is called before then.

The Yukon’s next territorial race is sure to feature prominently the contentious Peel watershed land use plan.

Both the Liberals and NDP support the recommended plan, which protects 80 per cent of the watershed from industrial development.

The Yukon Party government claims to have no position, but it strongly advocated for resource extraction and access during earlier stages of the Peel planning process.

Poll results       July 2010       March 2010     March 2009
Liberals                39%                   36%                  27%
NDP                      26%                 23%                   16%
Yukon Party     22%                    25%                  47%

Click here for more details on the Datapath poll.

Portrait of an iron play: Chevron & the Peel

2010-07-23T11:51:00.000-07:00

It's been more than 45 years since Chevron (aka Standard Oil) shut down its iron exploration project on the eastern flank of the Peel watershed. Its Mount Corp airstrip area, in the Snake River valley, has been listed as a contaminated site since the early 1990s. A recent visit to site shows it still needs to be cleaned up.

A giant fuel storage tank greets visitors to the airstrip area, two kilometres from the confluence of the Snake River and Iron Creek.

Torched by fire and twisted by time, the tank is a macabre monument to 1960s frontier development .

Bears wallow in the fuel-soaked soil beside the now-empty tank.

The tank doubles as a scratching post for bears, which leave calling cards of hair on the nuts and bolts that hold the panels in place.

Abandoned barrels - some embossed with the Standard Oil stamp - dominate most of the debris piles.

More obscure objects - like this broken airplane pontoon and wringer washer - make interesting company.

Trees slowly reclaim the 1.3-kilometre-long airstrip that used to host scheduled DC3 flights from Whitehorse. It was constructed with gravel hauled from the nearby creek bed.

A rusty relic serves as a signpost at the mouth of Iron Creek. A 14-kilometre road was built from the airstrip up this creek to the company's basecamp and exploration area.

The Snake River valley looking south towards Iron Creek and the contaminated airstrip site.

The last major bout

2010-07-14T17:54:00.000-07:00

The Peel watershed land use plan is headed for one last major round in the public consultation ring.

The first of a series of community meetings is expected to get underway by mid- to late-August, says Yukon government official Jen Meurer.

The meetings, planned for Mayo, Dawson City, Old Crow, Fort McPherson, Tsiigehtchic, Inuvik, Aklavik and Whitehorse, should wrap up by late September, she says.

Dates, times and places have yet to be finalized.

Jointly organized by the Yukon government and the four affected First Nations - Na-Cho Nyak Dun, Gwich’in Tribal Council, Tr’ondek Hwech’in and Vuntut Gwitchin – the meetings will guage public sentiment on the recommended land use plan released last December.

It calls for 80 per cent of the watershed to be protected from industrial developments such as mines, roads, railways and pipelines.

First Nations, conservation groups, tourism associations, opposition parties and the vast majority of the

Yukon public support large-scale protection in the Peel.

The only opposition comes from the mining industry. It continues to push for unlimited access and development in the wilderness watershed.

A website dedicated to the Peel consultation process should be up and running within a couple of weeks, Meurer says. An advertising campaign is also in the works to raise awareness of the meetings and the Peel process.

After this round of consultation, the five governments will go back behind closed doors to decide whether to accept, reject or propose changes to the Peel plan. Further consultation may follow before a final plan is agreed upon.

The five governments aim to present their formal response to the Peel commission by December.

Chevron should clean up contaminated Peel site, relinquish iron leases, groups say

2010-06-25T10:36:00.000-07:00

The Yukon government should refuse to renew Chevron’s 525 Crest iron leases because the company has failed to clean up its mess from the early 1960s, local ENGOs say.

In September, 2009 – just two months before the Peel land use plan was released - the oil giant applied to hang onto the leases in the Snake River region for another 21 years, even though they don’t expire until 2013-14.

The remains of Chevron’s 1962-64 exploration program include a derelict airstrip, old buildings, a radio tower, a huge fuel storage tank and dozens of fuel containers.

The site, near the confluence of the Snake and Iron Creek, was deemed a contaminated site in the early 1990s. The federal government has since paid for several studies to figure out what to do with it but no work has been carried out.

The Yukon Conservation Society and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society say Chevron should be forced to deal with the contaminated site before an extension of its leases is even considered.

“The company has a moral and legal obligation to clean up any contamination it’s responsible for, and the Yukon government has a responsibility to the Yukon public to make them do that before any of the leases are renewed,” says YCS executive director Karen Baltgailis in a June 24 news release.

Under the Yukon’s Quartz Mining Act, the leases can only be renewed if the company “has complied in every respect with the conditions of the lease and with the provisions of law and regulations.”

The Crest deposit straddles the Yukon-N.W.T. border. Chevron also holds iron leases on the N.W.T. side which are set to expire in 2014 but it has not yet applied to renew them.

Chevron claims it's no BP

Just last week the head of Chevron told a U.S. congressional hearing into the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster that his company was operating with the highest standards of safety and environmental stewardship.

“At the congressional hearing Chevron was basically making the point that they are more environmentally responsible than BP. That’s very ironic,” says Baltgailis.

“Chevron hasn’t bothered to clean up a relatively simple contaminated site along the Snake River and yet they expect us to trust them, not only to drill offshore off Canada’s east coast, but also to mine in the Peel watershed.”

The Snake River drainage is slated for protection in the Peel land use plan, but the Crest leases may prevent that from happening, the two environmental groups say.

The government has said it will not expropriate or compensate companies with claims in the Peel so Chevron should do the right thing and give the leases up, the groups say.

“We’d like Chevron to show that they really are different from BP, and that they really do have an environmental conscience,” says Baltgailis.

“We believe the social capital that Chevron would receive by making this timely and vital contribution to conservation would far outweigh the value of these remote, inaccessible ore leases.”

See related stories:
Chevron ignores contaminated site (May, 2010)
Chevron makes early bid to keep Crest leases (April, 2010)

Cash Minerals fades to black

2010-06-25T06:51:00.000-07:00

Goodbye Cash Minerals. Hello Pitchblack Resources.

The Toronto-based company - one of the largest mineral claim holders in the Peel watershed - has decided to completely reinvent itself.

The uranium and coal explorer has been struggling financially. It doesn't have much money and its shares have wallowed around the 2- to 4-cent mark for months.

The rebranding, along with a 20:1 stock swap proposal, were approved by shareholders at the company’s annual meeting in early June.

At the height of its Peel activity in 2007, Cash Minerals held more than 4,000 claims in the Wind and Bonnet Plume River region with joint venture partner Mega Uranium. Their plan to develop the Wind River Trail into a major access route even received government approval.

But they haven't done any exploration work since and nearly half of their claims have now expired.

Nor are there any plans to work the remaining claims this summer, Cash president Doug Currie said in a recent e-mail.

Instead, he said his company was going to focus on two new uranium projects – one in Mongolia and the other in the Thelon region of the Northwest Territories.

But recently both of those deals have fallen through, say company news releases.

Pitchblack Resources was launched into the financial world on June 25 under the trading symbol PIT.

The company is one of about a dozen penny stock exploration companies in the stable of Toronto businessman Stan Bharti.

See also:
Uranium explorers kiss claims goodbye (January, 2010)
A makeover for Cash Minerals (January, 2010)

Say a big N-O to mining in Tombstone Park

2010-06-18T11:04:00.000-07:00

A request by Canadian United Minerals to mine in the middle of Tombstone Territorial Park should be flatly rejected, the Yukon Conservation Society says.

The company plans to blast, dig and drill its 18 gold-uranium claims in the upper Blackstone River valley starting this summer. The project is currently under review by the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board.

For the next five years, Canadian United wants to run heavy equipment and set off explosives to get at the ore. It plans to haul 250 tonnes of bulk samples by snow machine about 46 kilometres, along the Blackstone River to the Dempster Highway.

“Blasting, trenching and drilling, in middle of Yukon’s iconic Tombstone Park is incompatible with the values Yukoners associate with territorial parks,” says the conservation society in an action alert urging people to send their written concerns to the YESAB and the local newspapers.

“The impact on tourism, especially from noise; the impact on the environment, especially on sheep from repeated helicopter overflights; and the impact on the land, especially from repeated snowmobile use on un-trailed areas, is simply not acceptable and is contrary to the spirit of the Tombstone Park Management Plan,” says the society.

“It is highly doubtful whether the impacts of the proposed mining activity can be mitigated to such a degree so as to not have an impact on the environment and on the experience of visitors to the park.

“Instead, the issuer of the mining claims and the claim holder should come to an agreement to end any and all mining activity within the Tombstone Park boundaries.”

The deadline for submitting comments on the proposed project has been extended until July 22, partly at the request of the Yukon government.

It needs a lot more information and time to properly analyze the proposal, it says.

Not only did the original proposal lack detail, the company has since made some changes that simply adds to the growing confusion.

Nine pages of questions, mostly from the government but also from the assessor, have been sent to Canadian United Minerals.

One of the most contentious and muddled aspects is the company’s plan for a winter trail along what it calls an “existing access route.”

But no such route exists, say the Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Gwich’in Tribal Council and Na-cho Nyak Dun. And even if it did, there are sections that would likely be impassable due to rough terrain and snow conditions.

In their submission, the three First Nations also point out the lower Blackstone River is slated for a high degree of protection in the Peel watershed land use plan.

“Clearly, any damage to the upper Blackstone will have serious effects further downstream,” they say. “Our efforts to protect the lower part of the drainage will be meaningless if the upper portion is compromised.”

The Yukon government spent $2 million on a new intrepretive centre for the park that opened in late 2009. Ottawa recently announced it's kicking in another $545,000 to put on the finishing touches.

The Canadian United Minerals proposal and all the response to date is posted on the YESAB website – Quartz Exploration at Tombstone Park, Project 2010-0107.

See also: Miner applies to work Tombstone Park claims

Firm pays pittance for Yukon oil & gas rights

2010-06-13T12:07:00.000-07:00

Northern Cross has picked up its 15th oil and gas permit in the Porcupine caribou herd’s range for a fraction of the price paid for the same parcel 10 years ago.

The Alberta-based company promised to spend $615,100 – about the cost of an upscale Whitehorse home – over the next six years in return for oil and gas rights to 19,773 hectares/48,860 acres in the northern Yukon.

The same block of land went for $8.2 million in 1999 when Anderson Resources/Devon Canada put in the successful bid. That permit, which was extended from six years to 10, expired last November.

The minimum bid is $400,000 and a 25 per cent deposit is required.

The Yukon government awarded the rights to Northern Cross on June 10 after conducting a call for bids on the requested parcel.

With this latest acquisition, Northern Cross has now sown up rights to more than 500,000 hectares/1.2 million acres of land in the Eagle Plain basin. Its total spending pledges ring in at $21 million.

The company was awarded its first 13 permits in 2007. It added another in 2009 and requested this new parcel when it came open six months ago.

Straddling the Dempster Highway, and including a corner of the Peel watershed, the new parcel is surrounded by the company’s existing permits and borders a significant discovery licence.

The Eagle Plain region is used extensively by the Porcupine caribou herd in both fall and winter.

The impact of industrial activity on the barren ground herd, already in steep decline, has been the public’s biggest concern since the government started handing out oil and gas rights in the region.

But each time the issue is raised, it’s quickly brushed aside.

Instead of curtailing industrial development to help the herd, the Yukon government recently imposed hunting restrictions and supports further reductions if caribou numbers continue to fall.

Related stories

Oil & gas call goes ahead despite caribou, Peel concerns

Yukon oil & gas call opens pandora’s box

Miner applies to work Tombstone Park claims

2010-06-10T10:38:00.000-07:00

Whitehorse-based Canadian United Minerals Inc. wants to dig, drill and blast in the heart of Tombstone Territorial Park beginning this summer.

The company has applied to the Yukon government for a five-year permit to work its Horn gold-uranium claims. The 18 claims are located on a branch of the upper Blackstone River, a major tributary of the Peel.

The company staked the claims in 1997, before the park boundaries were finalized. It was subsequently allowed to keep them.

But since the 2,200-sq.km park was officially established in 2004, Canadian United Minerals says it hasn’t done any work on the ground. Its old land use permit expired in May.

The Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board is currently reviewing its request for another permit, submitted by consultant Josee Bonhomme on behalf of company representative Joel White.

Photographs submitted by the company and posted on the YESAB public registry show its old camp remains at the site - an old wooden trailer, tent frames and half a dozen fuel drums sit in a cluster. Further up the slope, a bright, orange backhoe is parked where it broke down nearly a decade ago, its bucket still in the trench.

In its written application, the company says it wants to drill about 100 new holes, dig dozens of new trenches and use dynamite to blast rock during its five-year exploration program.

It also wants to construct five kilometres of two-metre wide trails for use by ATVs and heavy equipment to haul fuel, water and ore around the site.

The company says it’ll use helicopters to get in and out from the Dempster Highway during the summer months.

In the winter, it plans to haul 250 tonnes of ore with heavy-duty snow machines or possibly a tracked vehicle. The 46-kilometre route would follow the Blackstone River to the highway.

Although the company says its proposed route is an existing access, there is no mention of it in the park management plan nor is it marked on any of the park maps.

Downplaying the impact the project would have on park visitors, the company says the claims are far from the intrepretative centre and few hikers trek through the area.

As for wildlife, the company says the project is located in a “dead end” valley seldom used by animals.

The Tombstone Park Management Plan shows the project is near an important sheep lambing area and lies along a major wildlife travel corridor.

The deadline for public comment was originally set for June 8 but it has been extended to June 22.

The proposal and comments can be viewed on the YESAB website (project 2010-0107 in the Dawson assessment region).

Mining honchos launch attack on Peel plan

2010-05-21T13:09:00.000-07:00

An influential group made up mostly of Vancouver-based mining executives is calling on the Yukon government to gut the Peel land use plan, or throw it out entirely.

“If adopted unchanged, the recommended plan would result in considerable land alienation, more complexity and increased hurdles for mining companies,” says the Yukon Minerals Advisory Board in its 2009 annual report.

“YMAB strongly recommends YG work with the other stakeholders involved in the land use planning process to significantly amend the Recommended Peel Watershed Regional Land Use Plan or, failing that, reject it, ” says the report.

The Peel plan, released last December, protects 80 per cent of the region from industrial development.

It’s the result of five years of research, analysis and public consultation by an independent planning commission. Large-scale protection is supported by First Nations and the majority of Yukoners.

Seven of the 10 members on the advisory board run mining or exploration projects in the territory from head offices in B.C. Only one company has interests in the Peel region.

The board did not submit any written comments to the Peel commission during its extensive public consultations.

In its 2006-07 annual report, it lauded the Peel and North Yukon planning commissions for their “good work.” But just one year later it had changed its tune.

The 2008 annual report began a campaign against the Peel plan and the land use planning process. Its latest yearly offering simply builds on this theme.

The 2009 report rails against the plan, saying it is “heavily biased toward outright protection, rather than balancing economic development and environment in a truly sustainable manner.

"This protectionist approach risks jeopardizing the economic future of Yukon for little gain, since very little of Yukon would be disturbed by mining activities in any case; economic deposits that make it all the way to a producing mine are rare and have very small footprints.”

Not only does the plan ban mining in much of the region, it also fails to allow for “future hydroelectric generating sites, electricity transmission route, potential oil and gas pipelines and other considerations essential to the economic well being of Yukon,” the board says.

In its opinion, land use planning should mitigate potential land use conflicts “to the extent reasonably and economically prudent” but it should not prescribe zoning and land alienation. That’s best left to environmental reviews and regulators, it says.

The Yukon government also needs to do a better job of telling the planning commissions what to do and what kind of plans are acceptable, it says.

Some of the board's other beefs in 2009 include the Yukon's water laws, the environmental review process and climate change.

The minerals advisory board is chaired by Stephen Quin, president of Capstone Mining which runs the Minto copper mine in central Yukon.

Board members include Copper Ridge Explorations president Gerald Carlson, North American Tungsten's Britt Reid, and Harlan Meade, president of Selwyn Resources.

Alexco Resource Corporation, the company developing silver properties in the Elsa and Keno City region, is represented by two executives, Rob McIntyre and Clynt Nauman.

The Yukon board members are geologist Al Doherty, businessman Jon Rudolph and Selkirk First Nation chief Darren Issac.

Chevron ignores contaminated Crest site

2010-05-17T17:18:00.000-07:00

It’s been 46 years since Chevron shut down its Snake River iron exploration program, but it’s never bothered to clean up its mess.

Not only does the oil giant still hold the ground, it wants to hang onto its 525 iron leases, each 160 acres in size, known as the Crest deposit.

It’s already applied to the Yukon government to renew the leases for another 21 years, even though they don’t expire until 2013-14.

But the federal government’s contaminated sites office says it hasn't heard boo from the company regarding a site that dates back to Crest's heyday between 1962 and 1964.

The Crest contaminated site is near, but not actually on Chevron's leases, and is currently classified as “abandoned.”

Since the site was first identified nearly 20 years ago, the only money spent seems to have come from the federal government.

In addition to spending on staff and visits to the remote site, Ottawa has twice hired consultants to do a comprehensive assessment of the “abandoned” Snake River location.

Seven old plywood buildings, a radio tower, and a giant fuel storage tank - empty but deformed by fire – sitting on a gravel pad, saturated with petroleum residue were documented there in the 1997 and 2006 reports.

Vegetation was overtaking the 4,300-foot gravel airstrip. And dozens of fuel drums and containers littered the area - some full, some empty, said the reports.

There was also a secondary airstrip, about 11 kilometres up Iron Creek, near the former 45-person base camp which was linked to the main airstrip by a road the company built at the time.

Chevron last renewed its Yukon iron leases in the early 1990s. That was before the contaminated site had been identified and before Ottawa had turned over management of land and resources to the territory in 2003.

Last fall when Chevron applied for another 21-year extension, the Peel Watershed Planning Commission was finalizing a land use plan that recommends the Snake River drainage be protected from any further industrial development.

The Yukon government has said it will not compensate companies with mineral claims in the Peel the final plan bans mining. It has also put a moratorium on new claims until the plan is finished.

While the territory mulls over Chevron’s renewal request, the federal contaminated sites branch grapples with questions around remediation of the Snake River site, such as who should do it and who should pay for it.

The Yukon government could require Chevron to clean up the debris before agreeing to extend its leases until 2034-35.

Under the Quartz Mining Act, leases can only be renewed if "the lessee furnishes evidence to the satisfaction of the minister that during the term of the lease he or she has complied in every respect with the conditions of the lease and with the provisions of the law and regulations."

The cost of cleaning up the Snake River site was pegged at between $560,000 and $688,000 in the 2006 Hemmera report, but prices have risen since then.

Based on information gathered for the 1997 site report, the Hemmera consultants said the contaminated soil should be treated, the fuel storage tank dismantled, the buildings demolished and the airstrip deactivated.

Oddly enough, neither report makes any reference to Chevron (formerly Standard Oil of California) or the subsidiary it created to oversee the iron project, Crest Explorations, unlike other government documents such as the 1994 Crest assessment report.

Yukon oil/gas call goes out despite caribou, Peel concerns

2010-05-07T10:57:00.000-07:00

Oil and gas rights for a land parcel in the Porcupine caribou’s winter range went up for sale this week, just days after the Yukon government signed a deal to protect the faltering herd.

The parcel also includes a small piece of the Peel watershed – a region the government has ordered off-limits to new oil/gas dispositions and mineral claims until a land use plan is finalized.

But these contradictions seemed to matter not.

In a report to Energy Minister Patrick Rouble, the oil and gas branch recommended the call for work bids go ahead and the parcel was put out to tender May 6.

The Peel “overlap” was not removed as requested. Taking eight hectares out of the 19,773-hectare parcel would have “essentially sterilized” oil and gas rights in the area, according to the call for work bid document. It doesn't explain how or why.

It does point out the parcel was selected shortly before the staking ban was imposed, and that no surface access will be allowed on the Peel lands while the moratorium is in place.

As for the declining Porcupine caribou herd - which winters in the Eagle Plain/Peel watershed region and whose population has dropped by nearly 50 per cent in 20 years - the government leans heavily on “mitigative measures” and “best practices” to assuage public concerns.

The impact another oil and gas permit will have on the barrenground herd was by far the biggest issue raised during the public consultation process.

Especially since this land parcel is surrounded by existing permits and will be the 15th granted in the Eagle Plain basin since 2007 – all to Calgary-based Northern Cross.

Fear not, it says.

“The government of Yukon is confident that the use of best management practices, recent conservation measures implemented by the Yukon Department of Environment, the Porcupine Caribou Management Plan and mitigation measures will ensure the protection of the Porcupine caribou herd and other northern caribou populations, “ says the call for bids.

Although there is no “oil and gas best management practices for caribou” at the moment, the government says it’s working on some.

Likewise, concerns about new access roads and more off-road vehicle use were brushed aside.

“The government of Yukon is confident that the use of best management practices and mitigative measures, such as those found on the Oil and Gas Resources website for seismic activities, will limit the detrimental effects of new access,” the document says.

Best practices were also touted as the cure-all for any impact on tourism and historic resources.

Oil and gas companies have until June 9 to put in a minimum $400,000-work bid, along with a 25 per cent deposit.

The six-year permit will go to the highest bidder. It can be extended for another four years if a well is drilled.

Ten years ago Anderson Resources promised to spend $8.2 million exploring for oil and gas on this same parcel of land. That permit expired in November, 2009.

Oil & gas posting opens pandora's box

2010-04-28T16:04:00.000-07:00

A recent request for oil and gas rights to land that straddles the Dempster Highway may have put the Yukon government in a bit of a bind.

The requested area, mostly covered by the North Yukon land use plan, also includes a small piece of the Peel planning region. Trouble is the government recently banned any new mineral claims or oil/gas dispositions in the Peel until at least 2011.

The parcel also lies in the wintering grounds of the dwindling Porcupine caribou. The herd is in such rapid decline the Yukon recently banned all hunting of cows, a controversial move that has prompted an aboriginal rights lawsuit.

This same parcel was covered by an oil and gas permit for 10 years, but that expired last November. It is completely surrounded by six of 14 other permits granted to Calgary-based Northern Cross since 2007, and borders a significant discovery licence.

The Yukon government accepted the request for posting in January - five days after vowing to save the Porcupine herd and 14 days before imposing the staking and disposition ban in the Peel.

About halfway through the 60-day consultation period that followed, oil and gas rights manager Debra Wortley told stakeholders the government had just realized the parcel overlapped a small part of the Peel region.

The gaffe was only apparent after looking at an “extremely large scale” map, she said.

Nor did the recommended Peel plan make any reference to it, she pointed out.

But rather than take the contentious land off the table, Wortley pitched another option.

“It is our proposal that both the call for bids and the permit state that surface access in the eight-hectare area would not be allowed until the [Peel interim land withdrawal] order-in-council prohibiting mineral activities expires,” Wortley wrote. “And that any activity within the permit location would need to comply with the objectives, goals and conditions of whichever land use plan the activity takes place.”

Bad idea, said the Yukon Conservation Society.

“In order to comply with the spirit of the order-in-council, the government’s commitment to include oil and gas activity in that withdrawal, and to honour the intent of the Peel Watershed Land Use Plan, the Yukon Conservation Society strongly asks that any and all lands within the Peel watershed, no matter how small, not be part of the Spring 2010 Oil and Gas Disposition,” the society wrote in its submission.

The Peel also topped a long list of concerns from the Gwich’in Tribal Council about the requested parcel.

“Land use planning should be completed prior to any development activities allowed within the Peel River watershed,” it said in its response.

Other submissions zeroed in on how the caribou would cope with even more activity.

Given the growing number of oil permits recently granted in the region, the cumulative impact has to be considered, said the Porcupine Caribou Management Board.

Although the herd hasn’t been counted since 2001, it’s believed to number about 100,000, down dramatically its 1989 count of 178,000.

The board is working on a harvest management plan to help fend off the decline. It will likely mean changes to current hunting practices.

“If the traditional caribou users are being asked to alter their harvesting activities, it goes without saying that other human activities in the range of the herd need to be altered or avoided for the good of the Porcupine caribou herd,” said the board in its submission.

“In this case, we believe that conservation of the herd should be of utmost importance when you consider the request for postings.”

Environment Yukon emphasized the caribou's use of the area and noted the lawsuit by two N.W.T. aboriginal groups against the recent hunting ban.

“In light of recent conservation measures implemented by Yukon government for this year, coupled with a pending court case, it is understood that EMR [Energy, Mines and Resources] has agreed to consider timing of the posting in reference to such legal proceedings,” it said.

The public comment period wrapped up at the end of March. Officials are now preparing a recommendation report for the minister. If approved, the next step in the process is a call for work bids. It was originally scheduled to begin April 26 and run until early June.

When Anderson Resources/Devon was awarded rights to this same parcel in 1999, it promised to do $8.2 million worth of exploration work. The minimum bid accepted is $400,000.

First Nations reprimand Edzerza for Peel spiel

2010-04-20T11:26:00.000-07:00

This an open letter to Yukon Environment Minister John Edzerza from the chiefs of the Na-cho Nyak Dun and Tr'ondek Hwech'in First Nations.

We refer to your speech in the legislature on Monday, March 29, 2010 about the Peel watershed, in which you imply that your words speak for our affected first nations.

The Na-cho Nyak Dun and Tr’ondek Hwech’in First Nations governments have made their position clear to the Peel Watershed Planning Commission through the land use planning process mandated by our final agreements.

Your ambiguous and potentially misleading statement about first nation desires in the Peel watershed is not well received by our governments. [Your] quote: “I know that even the first nations probably have not ruled out any kind of economic development activities that might be available to them in that region because it’s a massive amount of land.”

For your information, Na-cho Nyak Dun and Tr’ondek Hwech’in First Nations have given serious thought as to how and where to work with both renewable and non-renewable economic development activities in our traditional territories.

Our first nations are working actively with the non-renewable sector, as shown by our engagement with mining and exploration companies south of the Wernecke Mountains and in the Dawson region.

However, protection of the headwaters of the Peel River and the entire Peel watershed is of paramount importance to us. We are not interested in seeing further development of non-renewable industries or roads in the Peel watershed.

We ask that you understand and respect that it is our first nation governments which speak to our position on the Peel watershed. This is not your prerogative.

We will not give up in our endeavour to protect the Peel watershed. We, the first nations, would greatly appreciate your support to protect this portion of our traditional lands.

Chief Eddie Taylor
Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Dawson City

Chief Simon Mervyn
Na-cho Nyak Dun, Mayo

Peel a poster child for free-entry staking woes

2010-04-15T15:07:00.000-07:00

Pull out a mining map of the Peel and a haphazard patchwork of mineral claims stares back.

More than 8,400 claims – each 51 acres in size – lie scattered across the landscape, without any regard for other land uses. The clusters come in all shapes and sizes, clinging equally to ragged mountain tops, forested valley floors, and flowing creeks and rivers.

All but 1,600 were staked since work began on a land use plan for the watershed in late 2004.

Most are owned by penny stock companies, based in Vancouver or Toronto, who used the remote region as a “pump and dump” playground before the 2008 stock market crash brought the financial fun and games to a halt.

The Peel land use planning process is left to live with the legacy of this staking free-for-all - a result of the Yukon’s archaic free-entry system which is built on the premise that mining is the first and best use of Crown land.

That's not fair, Yukon NDP MLA Steve Cardiff told the legislature this week as he laid out a compelling case against the free-entry system.

“It’s not a balanced way to manage public lands in the territory, and it is not a rational or thoughtful approach,” said Cardiff, who introduced a motion calling on the government to update the quartz and placer mining laws.

“There is no point [with the free-entry system] where the public can question whether or not it wants exploration in a specific region. They don’t have that right, or they can’t question whether exploration can take place for a specific mineral, such as uranium.”

No other industry enjoys such freedom. With forestry and oil/gas, First Nations and the public are consulted about the activity's location before any land is given out, he said.

But with mineral claims, there is no such advance notice. Nor is there any opportunity for other uses to be considered, such as such as conservation or recreation, before the claims are awarded.

The free-entry system also raises legal questions about aboriginal rights and the duty to consult, Cardiff pointed out.

The outdated system is not only causing conflict in the Peel.

Whitehorse cross-country skiers were horrified to find out a company had staked claims on top of a large swath of their treasured trail system. Dawson City residents are grappling with the rights of a placer miner to dig for gold next door to a residential subdivision. And in Keno City, Alexco Resources is building a mill on its claims on the edge of town, despite serious environmental and health concerns raised by local residents.

A recent public opinion poll on Yukon attitudes towards the environment also found opposition to the free-entry system, especially in the Peel watershed.

But the territorial government seems unfazed by all the fuss.

In response to Cardiff’s motion, Energy, Mines and Resources Minister Patrick Rouble defended the free-entry system, saying it increases the odds of a discovery and protects proprietary knowledge.

Besides, he added, less than one in 10,000 mineral showings discovered ever turns into a mine.

“Free entry is simply a system that allows the entrepreneurial spirit to exist, but it in no way reduces anyone else’s legitimate rights,” said Rouble.

No other MLAs spoke to the motion and no vote was ever taken because Rouble dominated the discussion for more than two hours, devouring all the time dedicated for the debate.

You can read the full transcript of this free-entry discussion in the April 14th Hansard.

Chevron makes early bid to keep Crest leases

2010-04-09T11:26:00.000-07:00

Oil giant Chevron has applied to renew its iron leases in the Peel watershed more than three years before they are due to expire.

The company has held leases for the Crest/Snake River deposit, which straddles the Yukon/Northwest Territories border, for nearly 50 years.

The 525 Yukon leases don’t run out until 2013-14, but last September Chevron asked the territorial government to renew them for another 21-year term, say government officials.

The renewal process seems dead easy.

There are no forms to fill out or annual work reports to file. The company simply has to swear it’s abided by the laws of the land and hand over $610 for each 160-acre lease, or $321,000 for all.

Last renewed in 1992-93, when the federal government still managed the Yukon's mineral resources, the decision now rests with the territory's Department of Energy, Mines and Resources. If approved, the leases would be extended to 2034-35.

Since Chevron asked for the renewal, the Peel land use plan has been released. It recommends 80 per cent of the watershed – including the area of the Crest deposit – be protected from any new industrial activity.

In February, the Yukon government banned mineral staking in the watershed for a year and put a halt on new oil, gas or coal dispositions while the plan is finalized.

The Crest deposit was discovered in 1961 by geologists working for the Standard Oil Company of California, now known as Chevron. It created a new company, Crest Explorations, to handle the play.

Hundreds of claims were staked and a major geological mapping program was undertaken. A railroad to haul the ore to tidewater in southeast Alaska was also considered.

By 1963 the Crest exploration program had hit full stride, according to its assessment report.

Workers built a 4,300-foot airstrip on a flat bench at the confluence of the Snake and Iron Creek, and a nine-mile gravel road to the 45-person base camp. Eighteen holes were drilled and more than 100 tons of ore was mined and shipped out for testing.

The Snake water levels were monitored for hydro potential and Iron Creek was eyed up as a water source for a mill.

The company even courted the Japanese steel industry, convincing a technical team to visit the property that it said contained about 20 billion tonnes of iron ore.

And then it all fell apart.

The high cost of the remote location, concerns over the quality of the ore and falling ore prices conspired against the Crest deposit and the company decided to shut the project down. By 1965 the site was all but abandoned.

Chevron did hang onto the claims and in 1972 converted them to leases, the most secure form of tenure. That required a legal survey and proof that each 160-acre parcel contained an iron deposit.

Since then the company has dusted off the file every once in a while to see if time has worked some magic, but the results have never been that encouraging.

Most recently, in 2006, when the Yukon and Alaska were busy talking trains, Chevron had the project appraised with a view to putting it up for sale.

The Hatch Consulting report concluded it was “worthy of future development to define the resources and processing and infrastructure options” but urged the company to update the resource estimates to meet current measurement standards.

Yukon gov't breaks Peel silence but says what?

2010-03-30T11:39:00.000-07:00

Yukon Premier Dennis Fentie has finally sent out a passenger pigeon to deliver a murky message on the Peel watershed.

Newly-appointed Environment Minister John Edzerza, who recently rejoined the government’s ranks after switching political allegiances four times in four years, delivered it to the legislature Monday during his reply to the budget speech, after refusing to discuss the issue during Question Period.

His remarks were prefaced with an apology to Fentie for anything nasty he may have said about the premier while Edzerza wandered the opposition wilderness.

With that delicate piece of business out of the way, Edzerza got down to the business of the Peel:

Now I would like to talk a little bit about the Peel watershed and land use planning because I’ve heard several comments made on the floor of this legislative assembly about me with regard to this issue. It was more from a personal perspective as opposed to a broader perspective where there are several stakeholders involved. This is not a decision of one person, the minister of environment. There are several processes that must be followed with regard to the Umbrella Final Agreement.

I know that the Yukon government honours the commitments made to First Nations under the final agreements and as such supports the work of the Peel Watershed Planning Commission. The Yukon government received a recommended plan from the Peel Watershed Planning Commission in December of 2009. The government will follow the review and intergovernmental consultation process set out under the First Nation final agreements and the letter of understanding signed by the parties.

Yukon government issued an interim sub-surface withdrawal from new mineral staking in the Peel region for one year in order to provide certainty during the review process. That’s a significant thing that the citizens of this territory will appreciate and recognize that it was a move that was necessary.

The Yukon government is working in partnership with the other parties to review and respond to the commission’s recommended plan. The response may approve, reject or propose modifications to the plan in accordance with chapter 11 of the Umbrella Final Agreement.

The Yukon government looks forward to a final recommended plan that reflects the variety of land use pressures and natural values within the Peel watershed and addresses the interests of the Yukon public, Gwich’in Tribal Council, First Nation of Na Cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation and the Yukon government.

The objective of regional land use planning is to provide guidance for the integrated management of lands and resources in order to ensure sustainable development and sound environmental stewardship while minimizing land use conflicts. It is very important that there is some semblance of balance. I know that probably the Yukon Conservation Society and CPAWS would probably like to see 100 per cent of the area become park; however, there were mineral claims staked in the area that have to be honoured also.

No government, I believe, would or should just totally do away with all of the existing activities that were in the area, and that includes wilderness tourism and hunting concessions. There is a lot of interest in that area, and for good reason, because it is a pretty virgin territory.

On December 2, 2009, the Peel Watershed Planning Commission publicly released the recommended Peel Watershed Regional Land Use Plan to the parties for their review and response. The commission will be inactive while the parties respond to the recommended plan.

In January 2010, the Yukon government, the First Nation of Na-Cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in, Gwich’in Tribal Council, and Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation signed that letter of understanding that I mentioned, outlining how the parties will work together to review and respond to the recommended plan. So there is a demonstration of a real joint effort here. It’s not a one-sided deal. The government is honouring what is in the land claims agreement.

The Yukon government has formulated a process for internal review of the plan and is currently gathering input to inform the technical responses.

The recommended land use plan proposed a number of concepts that represent key issues for Yukon government, including a large percentage — 80.6 per cent of the region is designated as a special management area — for heritage - 2.1 per cent, watershed - 27.7 per cent, general protection - 31.2 per cent, fish and wildlife - 19.6 per cent, presenting the issue of conducting and finding funding for those additional planning processes.

The remaining 19.4 per cent is designated as integrated management zones while a mere four per cent of the region contains grandfathered mineral claims — only four per cent. There is considerable public support for some form of protection to large wilderness areas of the region. The Yukon government supports the environmentally responsible development of Yukon natural resources.

Having said that, there are a number of other stakeholder groups who are interested in that area besides those lobbying for a park. You have — I mentioned earlier — wilderness tourism, hunting concessions, mining, maybe some gas and oil exploration. All these interests exist within that area.

I know the official opposition stated at the beginning of the sitting how complex this area is going to be to manage, and they’re right; it is going to be very complex and somewhat controversial on several fronts maybe.

As an arm’s-length body, the commission has the mandate to submit a proposed land use plan and land-management recommendations to the Yukon government and First Nations. The Yukon government and First Nations decide how to implement the land use plan on their respective lands. The parties involved consist of the Yukon government, Gwich’in Tribal Council, First Nation of Na-Cho Nyak Dun, and the Tr’ondek Hwech’in and Vuntut Gwitchin First Nations.

Having said that, it’s very simple to be able to determine that yes, this is going to be a process probably where there is going to have to be some give and take from the different stakeholders.

Definitely, from where I stand anyway, with all the different interest groups, we see that it can’t go just one way for one party, especially when there are so many separate parties involved within this region. Again, environmentally friendly, sound development — that’s important for people to understand that.

I know that even the First Nations probably have not ruled out any kind of economic development activities that might be available to them in that region because it’s a massive amount of land.

Peel protection receives Liberal backing

2010-03-30T07:59:00.000-07:00

The Yukon Liberal Party supports the recommended Peel watershed land use plan in principle, leader Arthur Mitchell told the legislature this week.

Recognizing the international significance of this unique wilderness watershed, the plan calls for the protection of 80 per cent of the region from industrial developments such as mines, roads and pipelines.

This is what Mitchell had to say:

The word “Peel” does not appear in the budget speech delivered last Thursday. It is one word that was noticeably absent. It was the ever-quotable Winston Churchill who said, 'Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice; it is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.' That statement certainly applies in this circumstance.

The government of Yukon has a choice to make here. It can be bold and lead, or it can keep its head down, refuse to take a position, and try to get through to the next election by saying, 'We’re looking at it.' It was obvious from the minister’s response on Thursday and today that the government has chosen the latter.

We’ve heard from many Yukoners on this issue, and we’ve taken what we heard into account, and we’re telling Yukoners about it well in advance of the next election. I would encourage the premier and the minister of environment to do the same, instead of stalling on this major issue. Let Yukoners know what position the government will take into discussions with other governments. It’s a choice that should be made, not ignored.

The final draft of the Peel watershed regional land use plan was produced by the Peel Watershed Planning Commission as part of the implementation of chapter 11 of the Umbrella Final Agreement, the final agreements for Na-Cho Nyak Dun, Tr’ondek Hwech’in and Vuntut Gwitchin First Nations, and the Gwich’in Comprehensive Land Claim Agreement.

We would like to thank the members of the commission for their work and Yukoners for participating in the process. This has been a long road and we finally have a recommended plan in front of us. Many, many Yukoners have invested a lot of time and energy into this process and we have confirmation that people have a strong interest in what happens in this part of the Yukon.

Yukoners know the premier worked hard behind the scenes to try and shape the contents of this report in a certain way. We know he interfered politically in the middle of the drafting process and tried to steer the commission in a certain direction. We also know the then minister of environment, the deputy premier, sat back silently and let it happen.

We have talked to hundreds of Yukoners over the last few years about the Peel watershed. We have met with interest groups, with stakeholders, with First Nation governments, with constituents, with non-governmental organizations and many individual Yukoners. We have listened to their input on what the land use plan should look like.

As a caucus we discussed the draft plan and the new final plan released in January of this year. We received a full briefing on the plan itself from the commission earlier this year. Some members of the caucus flew over and visited part of the watershed last summer, and as long-time Yukoners each of us has spent some time in the area in question.

After all this, we have concluded that much of the area should be protected from development for the foreseeable future. We support in principle the findings of the commission. They have recommended large parts of the area be preserved and we support their finding in principle. It’s not for us to draw the lines and vary the borders.

We now encourage the parties — the Yukon government and the four First Nation governments — to reach agreement on a final plan that is consistent with the principles stated in the final draft plan from the commission.

Now there have been concerns raised by some that the decision on how to proceed with the Peel will have an impact on future land use plans across the territory. We don’t share that concern. As the Peel Watershed Planning Commission clearly stated, this should not be viewed as a template for future plans, particularly with regard to the amount of land set aside for preservation.

As the Yukon Land Use Planning Council continues its work, they will find — and in fact, are already aware — that each planning region is unique and will require a distinct and frequently a different approach.

What is next? The commission has now met formally with the government of Yukon and the affected First Nation governments and informed them of the contents of the plan. First Nations have already made their views known publicly on the plan. They support it.

The reaction from the government on the other hand has been fairly muted. They have announced a one-year interim withdrawal from mineral staking of all crown land — category B settlement lands — and fee simple lands in the Peel watershed region.

The premier and the minister of environment have merely said they’re reviewing the plan. We are concerned that this response is a stalling tactic that the government plans to rely on until after the next election.

The government should take a position on this issue. They need to let the public know whether they support the plan or not. I’m urging the minister of environment to let Yukoners know what the government’s position is on this issue.

Let’s not let them drag this out until after Yukoners have gone to the polls. That is an easy way out, but it’s certainly not leadership.

A penny for the Peel

2010-03-26T13:54:00.000-07:00

Yukon Premier Dennis Fentie took to his political pulpit this week to preach about his government's plans for the upcoming year.

Noticeably absent from his sermon on roads and resources was the high-profile Peel watershed issue. Not a peep.

It would have fit nicely under the "protecting and preserving the environment" section of his 23-page monologue.

Just a line or two - before launching into the millions to be spent on cleaning up the Faro mine mess - would have sent a signal, albeit faint, that he is aware of the importance of the Peel to the peasants.

Better still, he could have earmarked a few thousand of his record $1.07- billion budget to some Peel project, like counting the Bonnet Plume caribou herd.

The northern mountain woodland herd - a species on the endangered list - lives entirely in the watershed. It has only been counted once, and that was nearly 30 years ago when Pan Ocean was going to build a coal mine near the Wind River.

Or maybe a study of fisheries and water resources. Or even a clean-up plan for the dozen or more contaminated sites abandoned by the mining exploration companies in the region.

But nary a penny nor a paragraph. The Peel seems to be a new four-letter word for the Fentie regime.

Liberal MLA Eric Fairclough, whose Mayo-Tatchun riding includes a large part of the watershed, also hoped to hear about the Peel in the budget, he told the legislative assembly Thursday.

The recommended land use plan was released in December, but the government has yet to say “anything substantive about protection or development in the Peel,” Fairclough pointed out.

“The territory is the largest landholder in the Peel, and Yukoners don’t know if this government intends to protect it, mine it, use it for tourism purposes, or all or none of the above," he said.

"It’s time for this government to take a position and let people know where it stands on the Peel. It’s not the time to stay silent in the hope of coasting into the next election without having to make any hard decisions.”

The government is working on "the appropriate solutions," replied Patrick Rouble, newly-annointed minister of energy, mines and resources.

“We are committed to a process to bring closure to the land planning exercise in the Peel area,” he said.

“There is a timeline that has been put forward and the clock is certainly ticking on that. We all look forward to seeing this matter concluded so we can see the benefits that will be conveyed then to all Yukoners into the future from having a very progressive plan for the area.”

The Liberals also put forward a motion, urging the government to work with the four affected First Nations and stakeholders "to develop a land use plan for the Peel watershed, prior to the next Yukon territorial election, that respects the principles set out by the Peel Watershed Planning Commission in its recommended plan.”

The plan recommends 80 per cent of the watershed be protected from industrial activity.

The next territorial election must be held by the fall of 2011.

Peel documentary kicks off APTN series

2010-03-08T11:41:00.000-08:00

The battle over the Peel watershed was recently featured in an environmental series on the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network.

Yukon bureau reporter Dez Loreen delved into the dispute between those who want the wilderness region protected and those who want it thrown open for industrial development.

The six-minute documentary was the first in the Perspectives on the Environment series that wrapped up with an indepth discussion featuring a panel of experts.

The vast Peel watershed lies within the traditional territory of four First Nations: the Tetlit Gwich'in, the Na-cho Nyak Dun, the Tr'ondek Hwech'in and the Vuntut Gwitchin.

Mining, gas and oil exploration companies are also interested in the region and its resource potential.

Peel prime climate change study candidate

2010-03-02T13:44:00.000-08:00

Wanted: intact wilderness areas for climate research

That’s what the Yukon government’s climate change action plan says is required to reach its first goal of increasing knowledge and understanding of the climate crisis.

“Undisturbed natural ecosystems are needed for monitoring and research to support climate change research projects in Yukon,” says the plan, released in February, 2009.

“These ecosystem study areas will support the gathering of knowledge required to understand and respond to climate change,” it says.

“These study areas will become part of national and international monitoring networks.”

The Peel watershed – if protected from industrial development – seems tailor-made for the job.

Not only is it large at 68,000 square kilometres, it is mostly untouched.

The only permanent residents live on its northern edge at Fort McPherson.

Its lone road, the Dempster Highway, just passes through the western corner.

Mineral explorers have poked and prodded the mountains, but no mine has ever come of it.

Companies have prowled the plains in search of oil and gas, but no well has ever gone into production.

Not a power line, rail line nor pipeline crosses the watershed.

The Peel’s many rivers and creeks have never been dammed or diverted.

Its fresh lakes and critical wetlands have never been drained or altered.

Its northern boreal forest trees have never been logged.

Barren ground and woodland caribou, moose, grizzly and black bears, sheep and wolves roam the region. Fish thrive in the clean waters and a rich variety of plants protect the land.

Already recognized as a highly-unique wilderness region of international significance, the Peel seems a perfect laboratory to help northerners come to grips with the rapidly changing climate.

Two political birds with one stone, and it's a carbon sink to boot.

Hunting company files for 28 Peel camps

2010-02-22T20:05:00.000-08:00

Bonnet Plume Outfitters has applied for 28 land leases in its Peel watershed hunting concession, including the controversial Copper Point camp.

The application does not have to go through the Yukon Environmental and Socio-Economic Assessment process, the territory’s lands branch has decided.

“A review of the activities associated with the application has resulted in a determination by this office that the project does not trigger an assessment through the YESSA,” the branch says in a Feb. 15 memo to a select group of government departments, organizations and area trappers.

Instead, the lands branch is conducting its own review and assessment.

It posted a brief public notice on its website with a map of the camps but no other details. Written comments must be submitted by May 4.

The company’s hunting concession includes a vast area in the Wind, Snake and Bonnet Plume River region.

Under the big game outfitters’ land policy, companies can apply for tenure to pre-existing 2003 sites.

Construction of the contentious Copper Point lodge and three guest cabins began in 2005 at an old mining camp on the east bank of the Bonnet Plume, a Canadian heritage river.

The government said it didn't give the company permission to build there and threatened to remove the buildings.

However, it backed off after reaching an out-of-court settlement with Bonnet Plume Outfitters in 2009. The company agreed to dismantle the lodge last fall and remove the three guest cabins by 2011.

The government said it could apply to rebuild the lodge at another site once it had documented all the camps it used in the area.

In its application for a three-hectare lease at Copper Point, the company says the barn-roofed lodge building is no longer there, but it has added a “mobile cookhouse” to its list of structures.

Photographs submitted by the company show a new cookhouse, in addition to the guest cabins, meat house and storage shed.

The company has also applied for three hectares for camps at Kathleen Lakes and Rapitan Lake. Like Copper Point, they also have airstrips.

It’s asking for a two-hectare lease for a camp at an airstrip beside the Snake River, and another on the Bonnet Plume, at Fairchild Creek, just south of Copper Point.

At Margaret Lake, it says it wants to dismantle an historic log cabin and get a two-hectare lease for another site where it has a tent camp used for fishing trips. It says it wants to build new cabins there.

It wants a hectare for its camp at the Bear River airstrip and another on a tributary of the Snake.

It's asking for half-hectare parcels at Pinguicula Lake, Gillespie Lake, Glacier Lake, Fairchild Lake, McLuskey Lake, Kiwi Lake and Quartet Lakes.

Other locations include the head of the Wind River, Rackla River forks, Rapitan Creek, Dolores Creek, Border Creek and two others on the Bonnet Plume, downstream from Copper Point.

The Yukon government and the Mayo-area Na-cho Nyak Dun First Nation will review the application and make "recommending decisions" through an established review committee, the memo says.

No mention is made of the land use planning process or why the application was accepted before a Peel plan is finalized.

Coal explorers let Peel licences lapse

2010-02-15T11:38:00.000-08:00

Four of the nine coal exploration licences in the Peel watershed have expired.

Three belonged to Toronto-based Cash Minerals. It applied for them in 2006 when it started to build its holdings in the Wind River region.

The fourth expired licence was issued in early 2008 to 18386 Yukon Inc., a company with ties to Promithian Inc.

In all four cases, the licences ran out after the companies did not pay the required annual work deposit for the 40,000-acre parcels, say government officials.

The deposit fee for the first year of a coal exploration licence is five cents an acre or about $2,000. It doubles to 10 cents an acre in year two and doubles again to 20 cents an acre in the third and final year of the licence.

Whitehorse-based Anderson Mining Company Ltd. owns the remaining five active licences. They are valid until March, 2011 as long as the yearly deposits are made to the Yukon government.

Its five adjoining parcels cover about 200,000 acres, mostly in the Wind drainage, and include six of the seven most promising coal occurrences in the area.

They were defined as deposits by Pan Ocean Oil 30 years ago, but the results have never been verified using modern standards of resource evaluation. Yet the seven make up more than half of the government-recognized mineral deposits in the Peel.

Based solely on Pan Ocean’s results, produced between 1977 and 1983, the Yukon government promotes the basin as containing 660 million tonnes of high volatile bituminous C coal.

It is thermal coal which iss used to produce heat and power. It's not worth nearly as much money as metallurgical or coking coal that is required for steel production.

Nobody doubts there is coal in the region but whether there is enough to warrant a mine is the question as the watershed's future is decided.

As far back as 1893, the burning lignite beds on the Peel River were noted by French explorer Count Edouard de Sainville.

When geologist Charles Camsell surveyed the Wind and Peel by canoe in 1905, he confirmed de Sainville’s findings and noted other coal occurrences as well.

More than 35 years later, as Canada’s deputy minister of mines, Camsell pushed for the Canol pipeline to be built from Norman Wells, N.W.T. to Fairbanks, Alaska, through the Peel watershed, in part because of its petroleum potential.

His enthusiasm rubbed off on Imperial Oil which sent a geologist to the Peel in 1949 to check it out. That marked the beginning of a government-orchestrated petroleum play in the northern Yukon that peaked in the 60s and 70s.

Pan Ocean Oil was a part of that play. By 1979 it had obtained coal exploration rights to almost 1 million acres in the Wind and Bonnet Plume areas.

It liked the results of its drilling program, and put the wheels in motion to build a mine and a power plant. Some of the coal would be exported. The rest would be used to produce electricity to sell to the Yukon grid.

Water, weather and wildlife studies were undertaken to provide baseline data. The caribou that wintered throughout the region, including the company's Kiwi Lake camp, were among the study subjects.

But before even so much as a pound of coal was taken from the ground, the company changed hands and the project was shelved.

Nearly 20 years later, Promithian Inc., a one-man company based in B.C., picked up where Pan Ocean had left off and began acquiring licences in 2001 for much of the same ground.

Marching out Pan Ocean’s results as proof of the potential, Promithian unveiled an elaborate $3-billion plan to build not only a coal mine and power plant, but also a steel mill and a 1,200-person camp at Illtyd Creek, a tributary of the Wind.

Using iron-ore slurry, piped from the Crest iron deposit on the Snake River, the mill planned to produce natural gas line-pipe for northern markets. A power line and a road would also link the two mines and the Wind River Trail would be transformed into an all-season highway.

The plans also touted coalbed methane production as a possibility.

But Promithian’s dreams soon faded and its exploration licences slowly slipped from its grasp.

In 2005, Anderson Mining picked up five of Promithian’s former exploration parcels and owner Mike Anderson pitched his own multi-billion dollar scheme to the Peel watershed planning commission.

In addition to an underground coal mine, its plan included a 40,000-barrel/day coal-to-liquids plant and a 390-kilometre pipeline from Illtyd Creek to Norman Wells.

Claim-staking banned in Peel until 2011

2010-02-04T19:49:00.000-08:00

No new mineral claims can be staked in the Yukon’s Peel watershed until next February.

After years of ignoring repeated requests to put a moratorium on claim staking until the land use planning process was finished, the Yukon government has finally responded by imposing a one-year interim withdrawal effective immediately.

Although no new claims can be staked during the ban, exploration work will still be allowed on existing claims.

There are currently about 8,400 quartz claims scattered throughout the watershed.

There were only about 1,500 when the planning process began in late 2004. That shot up to more than 11,000 by early 2009 because no moratorium was put in place. Since then about 3,000 claims have expired.

In addition to the staking ban, no new oil, gas or coal rights will be given out in the Peel during the next year.

The recommended Peel land use plan, released in December, calls for about 80 per cent of the region to be protected from industrial activity.

The Yukon and the four First Nation governments - the Na-cho Nyak Dun, the Vuntut Gwitchin, the Tr’ondek Hwech’in and the Gwich’in Tribal Council – are currently reviewing the plan.

They’ve agreed to wrap up their review by May, conduct another round of public consultation by October, and formally respond to the commission's plan by December.

They can either accept the plan, request modifications or reject it.

Zinccorp pumps Michelle project

2010-02-02T09:29:00.000-08:00

A Vancouver-based penny stock company is gearing up to drill the Michelle property, a block of claims that stretch from the Hart River’s Michelle Creek west to the Dempster Highway.

“We are currently planning and budgeting for our 2010 exploration program for the Michelle which will begin as soon as possible,” Zinccorp Resources Inc. president Richard Hughes says in a Jan. 26 news release.

The Vancouver company plans to drill at least 1,500 metres, but it doesn't say how much money it has earmarked for the exploration.

More than 780 claims, staked between 2006 and 2008, make up the Michelle project in the Peel watershed. The group includes a narrow band of claims that link the main block to the highway, along the proposed 25-kilometre access road.

The claims are in the range of the Hart River caribou, a northern mountain woodland herd estimated to number 2,200. Woodland caribou are on Canada’s species-at-risk list.

The barren ground Porcupine caribou herd, which has dropped from 178,000 animals in the late 1980s to less than 100,000 today, also winters in the area, as do Dall's sheep.

Zinccorp says it owns the Michelle project, but the Yukon government’s online mining claims database shows the claims still belong to Archer, Cathro & Associates.

That company drilled the first seven holes in 2007 and applied to the Yukon Environmental and Socio-Economic Assessment Board, on behalf of Zinccorp, in early 2008.

Several months later, with permit in hand and freshly-released 2007 drilling results that showed zinc, lead and silver potential, Zinccorp launched itself onto the stock market.

Another 23 holes were drilled and a staking binge upped the number of claims to 788 from 112 claims by the end of 2008.

Compared to the initial flurry of activity, the 2009 exploration program was a modest affair - a two-person prospecting team spent 20 days collecting rock and silt samples.

In an online promotional video released last fall, Hughes says he hopes to garner interest from a major mining company, like Rio Tinto, or from the Chinese or Koreans.

The Michelle project has all the right infrastructure, Hughes tells his audience. It is just “a few miles"off the Dempster Highway, and the 150-kilometre drive from Chapman Lake to Dawson City is described as an easy commute.

There is also "a power source with a gas pipeline to the north which could be extended down,” he adds, although nothing of the kind currently exists in the region.

Zinccorp Resources, which has traded in the two- to 14-cent range in the past year and currently sits at 8 cents, is one of eight companies in the Hughes Exploration Group of Companies.

Copper Ridge farms out Dempster property

2010-01-28T13:37:00.001-08:00

A block of mineral claims that straddle the Dempster Highway in the Windy Pass region, and include a section of the Blackstone River, may see a little drilling action this summer.

Ontario-based REC Minerals says it plans to spend about $550,000 looking for copper, gold and uranium on 272 claims, owned by Copper Ridge Explorations.

The helicopter-supported drill program is expected to begin in June,the company says in January news release.

The deal with Copper Ridge gives REC Minerals an option to acquire up to a 65 per cent interest in the claims, known as the Yukon Olympic project.

But before any work can take place, the project needs to get a permit. That includes going through the Yukon’s public environmental review process which takes at least a couple of months.

“The company expects that the required permit and drill rig and crew will be secured well in advance of the planned start of the program,” the company says.

The claims are located around kilometre 150 on the Dempster Highway.

Copper Ridge Explorations also owns 100 claims near Waugh Creek, in the Hart River drainage, also in the Peel watershed.

Yukon film festival showcases CBQM

2010-01-27T05:33:00.000-08:00

A documentary about Fort McPherson and its citizen-run radio station, CBQM, will be featured at the Yukon’s Available Light Film Festival in February.

Billed as “entertaining and insightful,” the film paints a portrait of the largely Gwich’in community as seen through the studio window of its radio station.

Perched on the banks of the lower Peel River, the northern town of 770 not only uses the station to exchange nuggets of news, but also as a cultural stage.

In between, the station's airwaves are said to be filled with the best damn country music in the region.

“More than just your average station, CBQM is a dependable pal, a beacon in the storm of life and a resilient expression of identity and pride for the community,” says the promotional material.

Directed by northern filmmaker Dennis Allen and produced by the National Film Board, CBQM has already snapped up the best feature documentary award at the 2009 ImagineNative Film and Media Arts Festival.

For a sneak peek, check out the CBQM trailer.

A makeover for Cash Minerals

2010-01-25T07:07:00.000-08:00

Junior explorer Cash Minerals, one of the largest claim-holders in the Peel watershed, has a new leader and a slightly new spin.

Geologist Doug Currie, chosen in part for his experience in the uranium industry, replaces Gregory Duras as president and chief operating officer, the company said in a recent news release.

Currie is also executive vice-president of Valencia Ventures Inc. and runs a private exploration company, Gwynva Resources Management. His 30 years in the resource industry includes a stint with Eldorado Nuclear Canada.

Duras, who led the company after Basil Botha departed in 2008, returns to his old job as chief financial officer.

The company has also hired an exploration manager. Sarah Palmer has worked on projects in Ontario, Quebec, Newfoundland and Nunavut “for a broad range of commodities, including uranium, having worked in the Thelon and Athabasca Basins,” it says.

Cash Minerals still jointly owns about 1,300 mining claims in the upper Wind and Bonnet Plume River areas with Mega Uranium. The pair let nearly 3,000 others expire over the past year.

Cash also inherited another 1,000 claims when it took over Signet Minerals and its Curie property.

Up until recently, the standard company description, tagged on to its news releases, gave top billing to its Wernecke uranium project in the Peel.

But no more.

The new description: “Cash Minerals is a Canadian-based energy company focused on uranium and coal exploration and development. The company owns the Division Mountain coal deposit and other prospective coal properties in the Yukon and owns a 100% interest in the Mike Lake gold project, also in the Yukon.”

As for Mega Uranium, a recent update on its Canadian exploration activities makes no mention of its Peel watershed claims.