Congress could consider comprehensive reforms to the 1872 Mining Law for the first time since the Mineral Leasing Act of 1920.
Items by Steve Hinchman
The death of Denver's Two Forks dam project has turned the state's archetypal Western water establishment on its head.
Zortman Mining Co., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Pegasus Gold Inc., recently proposed and won approval of a major expansion at its mine in the Little Rocky Mountains.
A growing grassroots concern for the environment is driving the West's 1990 elections.
Development of a mine under the 1872 Mining Law is radically different from development of any other public resource.
The fight over mining in the West may tum out to be one of the bloodiest environmental battles of the 20th century.
The Colorado River through the Grand Canyon rises and falls in lockstep with the West's demand for electric power. Now environmentalists are asking federal power authorities to let the river off its very short leash.
The Environmental Protection Agency has pushed the proposed Two Forks dam one step closer to oblivion.
Denver, Colorado's giant Two Forks Dam received a crippling blow on March 24, when Environmental Protection Agency national administrator William Reilly ordered his Denver office to begin a veto of the project.
The battle against Two Forks Dam was fought with two strategies, one within and one outside of the EIS process.
Writer Edward Abbey's sudden death on March 14th left the nation's environmental movement and lovers of wild and untrammeled land everywhere stunned and grieving.
The Bureau of Reclamation's grandiose plans -- laid out in the 1971 North Central Power Study -- to turn parts of Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas into an energy sacrifice area haven't come to pass.
The West's immense deposits of oil shale are estimated to hold more than 1.8 trillion barrels of oil, but so far they have proven far more valuable to lawyers and land speculators than to oil men.
Although the proposed Cisco toxic waste incinerator was rejected by Grand County voters, Utah still faces major decisions on toxic waste disposal.
Plagued by mistakes, accidents and incompetence, the Department of Energy's nuclear weapons production system is grinding to a halt, and the West, alarmed by the pollution in its midst, has begun to revolt.
Jackson Hole environmentalists and local government suffered two big defeats recently in the ongoing war over oil and gas leasing on Wyoming's Bridger-Teton National Forest.
Water marketing is increasing because of the rising cost of water and public resistance to dams.
All is not well with the nation's first planned nuclear-waste dump, the Waste Isolation Pilot Project.
One of the fastest growing and most lucrative sports in the West is river running, and river runners who once rafted at will now run on restricted launch dates and compete for access.
The Nature Conservancy is an anomaly in the environmental movement. It is apolitical, silent almost to the point of secrecy, friendly with corporate America, and run more like a successful business than a non-profit organization.
Wyoming, already hard-hit by the long decline in oil and gas prices and exploration, is further strapped without the taxes it expected from Exxon's LaBarge project.
Wyoming's Shoshone and Arapahoe Indian tribes are happily drowning in water rights following a victory over the state in the Wyoming Supreme Court.
Of the 11 sites proposed by nine Western states, one near Phoenix, Ariz., and another outside Denver, Colo., advanced to the Department of Energy's list of eight finalists in the intense national competition for the $6 billion Superconducting Super Collider.
Reopening the old Kennecott copper mine in Bingham Canyon outside Salt Lake City was happy news for Utah's economy. But it is a mixed blessing for Magna, a nearby town that sits next to what is probably the world's largest mine-tailings pond.
The war fought by the Reagan administration for the Department of Interior and the 500 million acres of public land it manages occurred in two great battles, waged by Secretary James Watt and his successor, Donald Hodel.
Few of our waters are free of polluting discharges. There are local success stories, but many state water agencies say they are barely able to maintain water quality at 1972 levels.
For three years, Peter Maier, a renegade engineer, fought Utah's water establishment over its water pollution-control program.
The nation's ailing uranium industry is glowing with anticipation now that a federal appeals court has barred the importation of foreign uranium for enrichment in the United States.
The Intermountain Power Project, the latest in a series of large power plants in the Southwest that keep California cities lighted, fired up this summer.
To the Rocky Mountain West, the $4.4 billion atom smasher represents economic development of the most desirable kind.
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