Dominant on the landscape, industrial-scale gold mines provided jobs
and tax revenues for parts of three decades in small communities that
came to depend on the economic support. But big open-pit gold mines had
such an impact on the environment that Montana effectively banned new
ones 16 years ago.
Now, as a Canadian corporation looks to develop
an industrial-scale gold mine in South Carolina, Montana is struggling
with the mess these massive operations left behind. Bankruptcies, sloppy
mining practices and sometimes lax oversight created expensive and
dangerous problems that other states could learn from as a new wave of
gold exploration extends to the Southeast, Montana regulators say.
http://www.heraldonline.com/2014/10/12/6412368_toxic-legacy-haunts-montana.html?sp=/100/104/&rh=1
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