Posted by David Sherman on Monday, January 16, 2006 at 12:26PM :
In Reply to: Re: The end of an era posted by Tom @ Snake River on Monday, January 16, 2006 at 0:25AM :
We could argue about whether agriculture or mining is next on the list. Or maybe not -- we've already shot the mining foot clean off, while agriculture is still hobbling along.
It's impossible to get a patent on a mining claim these days, and it's next to impossible for a small guy (i.e. less than $1 million to spend on engineers and lawyers) to get an operating plan approved for a small mine. Nowadays you either remove an entire mountain or you don't even try.
Once you start mining, the EPA tells you what method to use (generally the most expensive one, even if cheaper ones work fine) to clean the wastewater so it's cleaner than the water that's naturally in the river. If you actually gets some ore out of the ground, who's going to buy it? There are NO smelters in the United States any more! The only smelters available are in Trail BC (which the EPA is also trying to shut down) and Belgium (!).
Of course we don't need mining in the US any more because we don't make anything out of metal in the US any more. Mines and smelters are ugly so why mine and smelt in this country when we can buy finished goods direct from China and they can keep all the pollution on their side of the ocean? I hear China will be selling cars in the US in 2007.