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Money being wasted

According to Save the Wild U.P.’s attorney Michelle Halley, “A groundwater discharge permit is the wrong tool with which to regulate this discharge. It is undisputed that the water leaving the mine ultimately ends up in springs and rivers and Lake Superior. The permit needed is a Clean Water Act permit, designed to protect aquatic life.”

Yes Michelle, no scientifically intelligent individual can dispute that groundwater and surface water are all the same resource. If you and SWUP could even be bothered to look at the MDEQ/USGS groundwater viewer (gwmap.rsgis.msu.edu/viewer.htm), you would see that the exceptionally well-treated Eagle water discharged into the ground and water leaving their site underground must flow at least 1/2 mile before it discharges into the nearest creeks in the northeasterly flow path that the groundwater takes.

Eagle Mine cannot be held to changes in groundwater water quality resulting from naturally occurring minerals picked up along the way due to the naturally occurring geological formation through which the groundwater is flowing.

Further, Eagle Mine cannot be held responsible for changes in groundwater quality resulting from urination and defecation on the ground surface in that half mile of distance.

You can bet that urine and stool juices left by wildlife, SWUPer, hunters, fishers, hikers, atv-ers and other recreators are seeping into the groundwater between Eagle Mine and the local creeks.

The funny part is that many SWUP members, supporters and legal eagles live outside the city where they urinate and defecate into a septic tank which discharged underground into a septic leach field.

Where is there groundwater/surface water discharge permit? Their septic leachate also eventually discharges into local springs, creeks, rivers and Lake Superior. It is a good bet that Eagle Mine treated discharged is much cleaner, safer to drink and ecologically friendly than the SWUPers septic leachate.

SWUP lost their anti-mine battle long ago. Yet they continue to waste our tax dollars by conjuring up road blocks based on minutia designed to waste the government time and citizen tax dollars.

If SWUP members and supporters truly wish to save the wild U.P., then they should leave the U.P. Less humans in the U.P. means less human impact in the U.P.

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