e-3159 (Natural resources and energy)

Petition to the Government of Canada

• Strip mining in all its forms, including mountain top removal mining, causes irreversible damage to the environment, especially in the mountain environments of western Canada;
• Strip mining puts watersheds supplying clean source water to millions of Canadians at risk of permanent contamination and damages the groundwater recharge processes that protect water supplies;
• The impairment of clean water within the Rocky Mountains threatens billions of dollars in revenue and tens of thousands of jobs in agriculture, recreation, tourism, in-migration and supports downstream of the mines;
• Removing overburden exposes contaminated materials to the elements and destroys the habitats of threatened endangered wildlife including grizzly bear, woodland caribou, westslope cutthroat and bull trout, migratory birds, whitebark pine, and other species of flora and fauna;
• Current technology cannot remove contaminants generated by strip mining which are the source of wind and water borne pollution hundreds of kilometres downstream and downwind of mines;
• Current Provincial governments actively promoted destructive industrial activity in the Rocky Mountains without consideration of cumulative effects or consultation with Aboriginal communities and other citizens of their provinces;
• The Rocky Mountains are a unique environment and truly a Canadian national treasure and the source of water relied on by Canadians in the most water-stressed regions of our nation; and
• These intact landscapes are a resource that must be protected and preserved for generations to come.