S2, Ep 118: Ty Churchwell of Trout Unlimited

**Marvin Cash (00:04):**
Hey folks, it's Marvin Cash, the host of The Articulate Fly. On this episode, I'm joined by Ty Churchwell, the mining coordinator for TU's Angler Conservation Program. Ty shares his fishing journey in the details of TU's new Critical Minerals Campaign. The campaign's goal is to facilitate the responsible mining of minerals critical to the economic and national security of the United States.

But before we get to our interview, just a couple of housekeeping items. If you like the podcast, please tell a friend and please subscribe and leave us a review in the podcatcher of your choice. It really helps us out. And we've received several listener questions asking about the best way to support the show. In addition to subscribing in the podcatcher of your choice and leaving us a review, you can also support the show by using our affiliate link when you shop on Amazon. It doesn't cost you a thing and we receive a small commission on your purchases. You can also become a Patreon patron and make a single or a recurring donation. Links to both of these options are in the show notes. There wouldn't be a show without listeners like you and we appreciate your support more than you know. Now, on to our interview.

Well, Ty, welcome to The Articulate Fly.

**Ty Churchwell (01:19):**
Well, Marvin, thanks for having me. It's really great to be here.

**Marvin Cash (01:22):**
Yeah, I'm looking forward to our chat this evening and we have a tradition on The Articulate Fly. We always ask all of our guests to share their earliest fishing memory.

**Ty Churchwell (01:32):**
Oh, goodness. Well, that goes back an awful long ways. I have been an angler since my earliest memories and in that sense I would look to family trips around Rocky Mountain National Park. I grew up in the shadow of Rocky Mountain National Park and as a very little kid, started chasing cutthroats and brookies there in my home neighborhood.

**Marvin Cash (01:57):**
So were you born with a fly rod in your hand or did you come to the dark side later in life?

**Ty Churchwell (02:03):**
A little later in life. I was a spinner chucker for a long time and still do that once in a while. But I was in my early 20s I think when I started fly fishing.

**Marvin Cash (02:15):**
Very neat. And, you know, who are some of the folks that mentored you on your fly fishing journey and what did they teach you?

**Ty Churchwell (02:20):**
Oh, great question. You know, my group of mostly men friends that I hung out with in my twenties, we did an awful lot of backpacking. I went to school at the University of Utah originally and the Uinta mountains were not far from there and backcountry treasures. And those fellas and I, we really all sort of made the shift to fly fishing about that same time. And all of those guys played into the mentorship of teaching me the skill of fly angling.

And then a little later on, after I moved to Durango, Colorado around the year 2000, I became friendly with some of the guides here in town and was able to fish with them more on a personal basis than a guided paid basis. And boy, did those guys help me along, really teaching me the skills I needed to be a successful angler. And I owe an awful lot to an awful lot of people. But I am rich with friendships that have helped develop me as a fly angler.

**Marvin Cash (03:26):**
Very neat. And how long have you been with Trout Unlimited?

**Ty Churchwell (03:31):**
With the organization, about 15 years. I started out just as a regular paying member, someone who had a conservation bone in my body that needed development and a place to put it to work. And I just became involved with TU as a member here in Durango about 15 years ago and really found a passion for conservation. And one really, frankly, that I'd had even since I was a little kid but really a place that I needed to employ it here in the Animas River watershed of Durango. I came on staff 13 years ago. We have an office for Trout Unlimited for National TU here in Durango and our public lands program is headquartered here and they had a job opening and I applied for that job and have been grateful for this opportunity ever since.

**Marvin Cash (04:26):**
Very neat and is that the same position you hold today or did you have several positions to get to where you are within the organization?

**Ty Churchwell (04:35):**
Yeah, you know, I've had a little bit of movement. I started out doing place-based campaigns, really where we, Trout Unlimited, identify a specific place worthy of permanent protections. And I led a couple of campaigns, again, for legislative permanent protections. As an example, I was successful getting the Hermosa Creek Watershed Protection Act passed in 2015 that created a special management area for Hermosa Creek, about 107,000 acres, 38,000 of which is new wilderness.

But again, I live here in the Animas River watershed and many people I would think who listen to your podcast might remember the Gold King mine spill of 2015 where the Animas River turned bright orange. Photos of that mine spill circulated around the planet in a nanosecond. And we were certainly the focus, the world's focus on mining related water quality issues at that time. But living here in this watershed, you really can't be a fly angler and work in conservation without being keenly aware of water quality issues as they relate to hard rock mining.

So to answer your question, I really have shifted my focus now to mining completely. I no longer work on place-based campaigns but work on primarily federal mining policy, but also helping to lead a super fun cleanup of the mines in the headwaters of my home water.

Yeah, very neat. And so what does a normal workday look like for you?

Well, it's an awful lot of computer time, that's for sure. Doing policy work is a lot more time spent engaging with colleagues and working on documents as opposed to place-based campaign where you do a lot more community organizing. But again, I'm working on federal policy, primarily Good Samaritan legislation and this Critical Minerals campaign that we're going to talk about here in a moment. But again, working on mine remediation work via Superfund cleanup in our headwaters.

**Marvin Cash (06:50):**
Yeah, very neat. And, you know, kind of before we get to the Critical Minerals campaign, I wanted to kind of, I guess, start at the beginning. And my understanding is that kind of the bedrock for mining activity in the United States is the General Mining Act of 1872. And, you know, I know this is a super big question but I suspect you've been asked it in some form or the other. Can you kind of give us a brief overview, kind of starting in 1872, kind of with the evolution of mining policy in the United States?

**Ty Churchwell (07:22):**
Well, certainly. You know, this is post-Civil War era and the dawn of the Industrial Revolution. And the need for metals—iron, copper, you know, things like this, gold, silver—were quite strong at the time, again, because of the timing and a growing nation. And so the General Mining Act of 1872 was passed and it provided the framework for how the West, not just the West, but mining is performed in this country, hard rock mining in particular.

You know, it was well-intended and quite frankly was successful in what it was intended for at the time, which was again to explore the mineral resources of the West after the Civil War, develop those minerals, help fuel a growing nation and help to encourage settlement and westward expansion. And on all of those points I think 1872 was quite successful. We still mine in this country under the 1872 Mining Act. There have been some revisions to it through the years, more modern revisions. I can't remember the first date but I believe it was the 1970s, roughly 100 years after the original act was passed, have there been some revisions. But in general, it is still the law of the land and, again, the framework by which we mine in this country still today.

**Marvin Cash (09:03):**
Yeah and, you know, to kind of boil that down just a little bit more, you know, what do you think we've gotten right in the last 120-some years, almost 130 years, and kind of what lessons have we learned and what challenges do we still face in kind of balancing, you know, protecting the environment and getting the minerals that we need to sustain our economy?

**Ty Churchwell (09:26):**
Yeah, well, those are interesting questions. You know, what have we gotten right? Again, I just described that I think the law did exactly what it was intended to do and quite successfully. What have we learned? Well, environmental loss, environmental damage as a function of unregulated mining. We are still paying the price for that even today. And again, I live in a watershed where that is ever present.

And so we certainly have learned a lot of lessons about the impact to downstream resources that probably weren't evident at the time or maybe more accurately, they didn't really care. Again, looking at my own watershed here, I don't think anybody in the 1890s would have ever envisioned several hundred thousand people living farther down the watershed and a recreation tourism-based economy that relies largely, if not wholly, on a very healthy river.

And so we have learned an awful lot of lessons. Many of the environmental laws that we operate under in this country today, in part, were a function of the lessons that we learned from unmitigated mining in the early days. We still have some work to do on that. Most notably, the General Mining Act does not provide a provision for any sort of royalty being collected on minerals that are extracted on public lands or in general and that was probably a failure that, again, we're still living with that today. Mining is the only extractive industry that does not pay royalty into some sort of a mitigation fund or a place where impact can be corrected. So that is certainly something that probably needs to be corrected and something that Trout Unlimited advocates for and is working on as we speak today.

**Marvin Cash (11:27):**
And I guess in kind of broad buckets of problems, I mean, I, you know, I regularly read trout, like I'm sure lots of my listeners do. You know, I guess I'm familiar with acid mine drainage where I guess rainwater and groundwater basically leaches and becomes acidic and has all kinds of nasty downstream consequences. What other kind of major environmental concerns are kind of flowing out of hard rock mining?

**Ty Churchwell (11:53):**
Well, you touched on the big one and certainly water quality is the least for anglers. That's the most notable of the impact. EPA estimates that even today, roughly 40% of headwater streams in the western United States are negatively and in some cases severely impacted by acid mine drainage and that's a notable number. That's an awful lot of America's greatest trout rivers in the West do have some level of impact. Again, here in southwest Colorado, I could go on and on about the rivers that have impact.

So that's a biggie for sure and it's something that needs to be addressed. Again, these are the sorts of things that I work on today is trying to create either new policy or correct old policies where we can resolve those water quality issues from acid mine drainage. Beyond that, of course, mining has impacts in the sense that you're digging a hole in the ground, either a hard rock mine into a tunnel or an open pit mine and those have impacts just on the surface that may or may not include water quality problems, but there are impacts on the surface. This could be loss of land that is prime winter habitat for elk, as an example. So there are impacts and they're not all water quality related.

**Marvin Cash (13:27):**
Got it. And just to kind of help our listeners out, you know, how does acid mine drainage negatively impact the watershed? I mean, what does it do?

**Ty Churchwell (13:37):**
Well, great question. And a simple high school chemistry can answer that question. Many of the ore bodies where gold, silver, copper, the primary metals that have been removed over the years, often where they exist have sulfur in the ore body as well. Oftentimes it's iron sulfides in particular that are of biggest concern.

And so what happens, as you mentioned, is you have rainwater and snow that get into the mine workings and down into the mountain as groundwater and find their way out the easiest path, as water always tends to find. And in the case of hard rock mining where tunnels have been driven through mountains, that's the easiest path. And so groundwater leaches down into and through ore bodies containing sulfur, iron sulfides and what it creates is sulfuric acid. It's a simple chemical reaction with iron sulfides, water and oxygen. And when you have those three components, a simple chemical reaction occurs and you have acidity, sulfuric acid.

And the problem then comes from the low pH and the acidity of that water. What it does is it dissolves those metals or certain metals and it is in their dissolved form, such as cadmium and zinc and copper and a handful of others. In their dissolved form, they are toxic to aquatic living organisms such as trout and salmon and the bugs that they eat. So that's the simple answer.

**Marvin Cash (15:26):**
Got it. And does the acidic pH also, I guess, you know, I always think about like the streams in Pennsylvania that are slightly alkaline. Does that acidity also have, you know, even if you don't have the leaching of the metals, does it have a negative impact on the food web?

**Ty Churchwell (15:44):**
Well, it certainly does. The whole system then is impacted without the smallest organisms for the food chain, those being the microorganisms and then the insects that eat them and on up the food chain with the trout that eat the insects. When you hurt the bottom of the food chain, the whole system breaks down. And in headwater streams, again, where there are acid mine impacts and drainage, that's what suffers. And it works its way right up the food chain.

**Marvin Cash (16:14):**
Got it. And, you know, so we're sort of, you know, we touched on it a little bit earlier in the interview. You know, you've kind of got this literally for probably as long as we've tried to balance, you know, commerce and conservation, this kind of struggle between, you know, balancing mining, oil and gas and timber interest with other constituencies. And, you know, what framework do you think policymakers should use, Ty, when they're evaluating extractive opportunities?

**Ty Churchwell (16:44):**
Well, that's a good question. You know, certainly we would ask them to balance the extractive industries with conservation. We believe that they can. And in fact, we have many, many examples of where they do coexist with thoughtful policy and planning and a great deal of stakeholder and local engagement in the topic of a mining proposal as an example.

Oftentimes you can mitigate the impact and the troubles that could potentially come down the road up front with thoughtful policy decisions. I think you are certainly aware, as are your listeners, that the outdoor recreation economy in the United States is massive at almost $800 billion annually. And that's an important number for decision makers to consider.

Oftentimes, if a poorly planned mine or a troublesome environmental polluting mine were to impact jobs downriver, that offset could be notable. And those are constituents like any other. So we would just certainly ask the decision makers to be very well informed and consider the other constituents with a great deal of emphasis, in particular those of hunting, fishing and outdoor recreation.

**Marvin Cash (18:10):**
Yeah, got it. And, you know, we're going to kind of dig into this new TU Critical Minerals campaign here in just a second. But before we start, I was wondering if you could let us know, you know, what are critical minerals and why are they important?

**Ty Churchwell (18:25):**
Yeah, that's really the genesis of this whole thing. Well, there's an old saying that if it's not grown, it's mined. And mined minerals are the building blocks for today's way of life. But there are a handful of mined minerals of really significance and great importance.

And with that in mind, in 2017, the Secretary of the Interior, in coordination with the Departments of Commerce, Defense, Energy and others, defined critical minerals as a non-fuel mineral or mineral material essential to the economic and national security of the United States, the supply chain of which is vulnerable to disruption and that serves an essential function in the manufacturing of a product, the absence of which would have significant consequences for our economy or national security.

So the Department of the Interior, again, with these other federal agencies put together a list that fall under that definition. And the official list came out, I believe, in early 2018. And there are 35 minerals on the official federal U.S. critical minerals list. Two of those are subcategories of minerals which add an additional 23. So in fact, there are a total of 56 elements from the periodic table that are currently listed on the critical minerals list.

Many of these are household names that most people would recognize, such as lithium, cobalt, aluminum, helium and uranium. And certainly some lesser-known minerals, such as tellurium, rhenium and the rare earth elements. The rare earth elements are one of those subcategories. There are actually 17 elements within that category of rare earth.

So these critical minerals are essential to today's 21st century living. They're used in high-tech gadgets such as cell phones, televisions, laptops and tablets and other computer-related applications. In transportation, they're used in cars, in electric vehicles, in airplanes and railroad applications. And of particular note to those of us who are paying attention to climate change, critical minerals are vital to renewable energy applications and therefore climate change mitigation. As an example, lithium and cobalt are required for energy storage from solar panels and wind generation. And aluminum is key as a low-weight, high-strength alternative to steel.

So what's really important about the definition of critical minerals is that the supply chain is vulnerable to disruption and that's really an important component that we all need to pay attention to. Of the 35 minerals on the list, the U.S. is import-reliant for 31 of them. This means that we import more than 50% of our domestic consumption. In addition to that, the U.S. is completely reliant on other countries for imports for 14 of those 35 listed critical minerals.

So it's not just that these minerals were important to everyday living in the United States. What's really important is that there are supply chain concerns. Too often we source these minerals from unstable or unreliable source countries. Many of these may be without stringent environmental or labor laws. And in some cases, we have adversarial trade interactions or there are hostile diplomatic relations with that country. So again, we can import minerals from friendly countries and that may not be much of a vulnerability for supply chain. But there are 31 of these 35 where there are in fact issues.

**Marvin Cash (22:38):**
Got it. And so if we kind of roll out a map of the United States and say, well, we need to kind of control our destiny a little bit more, you know, what portion of the mineral deposits in the United States are located in environmentally sensitive areas?

**Ty Churchwell (22:56):**
Yeah, well, that's something that Trout Unlimited and our mapping team out of the office in Boise really dove into in the early days of this campaign. And really, this is something we've been embarked on since about a year ago. It's been something that has been on my radar here. We have critical minerals in our watershed and I'm aware of them.

But really, we became keenly aware of this issue with Executive Order 13817 that the Trump administration put out in 2017. Again, this is where the current administration started looking at the issue and started to develop policies around that. And so with all of that in mind, the first thing we had to do was put our mapping folks to work so we could see where these known mineral deposits are and what is their connection to or proximal relation to the places where America hunts and fishes and where protected public lands are.

So our mapping team is using the most up-to-date USGS layers available to anyone. In other words, we're using the same layers that are the federal agencies as they're looking at this mapping as well. But to our knowledge, until we did it, no one had really taken a good look at where these mineral resources are, where the known deposits are, again, in proximity to trout and salmon habitat in particular.

So after performing the mapping and the analysis, we started developing some data and some numbers and particular notes. Of all the known critical mineral deposits in the lower 48 in particular, about half of them are in current trout and salmon habitat. And roughly one in 10 are in currently protected public lands such as wilderness areas or national monuments or roadless areas. So again we've got the most up-to-date data and one of the things that we're strongly encouraging is even more information and mapping. It all starts there. We have to understand where these resources are before we can make policy decisions.

Yeah and it's really neat too. I remember looking...

**Marvin Cash (25:19):**
...on your website when I was preparing for this interview. I mean, you've got an interactive mapping tool so anybody that wants to right can basically sit down and put their watershed in and see what's going on in their neck of the woods.

**Ty Churchwell (25:29):**
Yeah, that's correct. It's the newest GIS mapping tool. And so any user, including an elected official or a decision maker or a fly shop owner, for that matter, can go look and see, is there a deposit of beryllium, as an example, in the headwaters of my home river? You know, what does the protected public land in my backyard—should I be concerned at all if protections are overturned and they go seeking a mineral deposit in a wilderness area in my own backyard? So the mapping tool is really great. We do encourage anybody and everybody to go use that. It's a great way to take a look at this issue.

**Marvin Cash (26:16):**
Yeah and I'll drop a link to that in the show notes. And, you know, you gave us, Ty, kind of a really high-level idea of kind of what was at risk. But, you know, can you give us some examples that, you know, if you gave us the name, people would be like, oh, I know exactly where that is that, you know, TU is already starting to become particularly concerned about?

**Ty Churchwell (26:36):**
Yeah, yeah, you bet. You know, for fly anglers and I'm going to, I'm a Western guy, so I'm going to speak of Western resources, fishery resources, more than anything. And additionally, most of the critical mineral deposits, probably three quarters of them, if I were just to guess, are in the West.

But the Salmon River in Idaho comes to mind right away. When we started doing our mapping analysis and in particular, where are those deposits that are in currently protected public lands, it was central Idaho where it just became abundantly clear that there are quite a number of mineral deposits in these protected public lands. Many of them are right there in the area of the Clearwater and the Snake and the Salmon. So those are a couple of rivers of note.

The rivers of Colorado, you know, the Arkansas, the Animas, you know, the upper Colorado, the Gunnison—these rivers as well. They have critical mineral deposits in their watershed as well. And really, other than the real southwest corner of the country, as we start to get into those hotter, more desert types of environments like New Mexico, Arizona, Southern California, southern Nevada, where we move away from trout and salmon resources. There are deposits there as well, but boy, they sure are heavy in and near the most famous trout rivers in the West.

**Marvin Cash (28:06):**
Got it. And so, you know, you've, you know, kind of the red light started flashing when the Commerce Department said we want to basically become more sufficient in these minerals. And, you know, we see this kind of the theme we've talked about earlier, this kind of struggle between commerce and conservation. So you've done the mapping. How does that translate into advocacy for the resource down the road?

**Ty Churchwell (28:34):**
Well, it first starts with letting our constituency groups understand the issue. We put out this critical minerals report and I know that you're going to provide a place for your listeners to get to that. I can certainly give you a URL as well. But it starts with understanding the issue. Again, the minerals we're talking about here, there's nothing partisan about this. We all have cell phones. We all drive cars, you know, et cetera. So it is an issue for the country as a whole.

But when it comes to where development could take place, where there could be injury or impact, hunters and anglers in particular really need to take note. And so that was part of the reason for putting out the report was to educate our own constituency groups, get them involved in the conversation, make sure that our voices are being heard with decision makers and those who develop policy.

Then secondly, you know, we want the report to speak for sportsmen and sportswomen and our values and our desired course of action and a more responsible path forward than, say, opening up a wilderness area for a new mine. And so the report is meant to help educate elected officials as well and decision makers.

Again, our mapping, as far as we know, no one had done that overlay of trout and salmon habitat. So we've done something that we hope decision makers and those who develop policy will take care to look at with intensity. And again, we outdoor recreation folks are a big chunk of the U.S. economy and, you know, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of jobs in this industry. And those are constituents of decision makers. And so we do hope that everyone will pay attention.

But again, the issue of supply chain concerns and the need for these minerals, it's across the board. It's something all of us should pay attention to.

**Marvin Cash (30:36):**
Yeah and I know kind of one of the core parts of the campaign is you laid out, I don't know, there are probably 10 to 12 tenets that kind of cast kind of a, I guess, a philosophical umbrella around this issue in terms of the way, kind of back to what we talked about earlier, you know, policymakers should think about kind of this issue transparently and holistically.

And, you know, one of the things that the tenets advocate is, you know, looking for recycling substitutes or technological advances to minimize the need for additional mining and exploration. And I was kind of curious. I mean, obviously, it's very early. But do you have a feel for, you know, if we were to kind of work smarter, for lack of a better word, you know, how much of the need for critical minerals we would be able to offset without additional mining activity?

**Ty Churchwell (31:34):**
Yeah, that's really the way that we looked at this. And I'll take this opportunity to mention that when we developed these tenets, we did a great deal of outreach and I don't mean just within the hunting and angling community, but we spoke with people in the renewable energy industry. TU has really awesome and important partnerships with major mining companies. We sought input from them, from the National Mining Association, from mining reform advocates, from traditional environmental folks, from businesses that need these minerals for production of products right here in this country.

So although it may represent a sportsman's opinion, it certainly has taken a great deal of input from a whole host of folks and stakeholders in this issue. So the tenets, you're correct. There are 12 of them in number. And quite simply, we can't mine ourselves out of this issue of supply chain concern. We certainly could. It wouldn't be the responsible way to go and that's really what the tenets seek to resolve here.

So reducing use right off the bat is one of the things that we can do to limit the amount of new mines that may be necessary to meet our needs by, again, recycling, substituting critical minerals, reprocessing ore that's already been processed from a mill at a mine somewhere else. And above all things, if new mines need to be developed somewhere, that we are very diligent as a nation to avoid these key resources, in particular for us, those hunting and fishing resources that are really important to our constituency group.

The current administration, in recognizing this issue of supply chain concerns, put out a report in 2019, I guess, a federal strategy for critical minerals and it outlined a number of goals and actions and steps that should be taken. And many of those actions we agree with completely. In fact, our tenets really mirror what some of those actions are in the federal strategy. However, there are also actions outlined in that strategy which we find horribly problematic. And again, we've already spoken of those to a degree, you know, rolling back protections for currently protected public lands being one of those.

But another one of the suggested actions put forward was, you know, weakening or removing environmental safeguards that should be employed in every mining case, including critical minerals. And so we would urge that there be no circumventing of current environmental laws, that we don't weaken NEPA as an example, as a place for public review and participation in the development of a mine proposal.

There are some places, quite frankly, that are just too special to mine, period. And our report speaks about that as well, one of those places being the Boundary Waters Canoe Area in northern Minnesota, which has a proposal on its doorstep as we speak today.

So there are 12 tenets and again, this is what we would recommend as a framework for a responsible way to move forward. They're as all-inclusive as they could be but they're meant to be a place to start a discussion, not necessarily finish the discussion. This is a 21st century problem. It requires 21st century mining policy and what we've attempted to do here with the tenets is put out there what we would recommend from a sportsman's perspective, again, with a great deal of input from others.

**Marvin Cash (35:47):**
Got it. And we touched on this a little bit earlier in the interview but I also, if I recall correctly, one of the tenets also talks about, to your point, reserving a royalty for mining on public lands for mitigation and reclamation. And I was really kind of curious. It kind of made me think, well, gee, how do we currently handle that if money is not being set aside as resources are being extracted from public lands to close and properly remediate mines?

**Ty Churchwell (36:19):**
Yeah, well, that's a two-part question. So let me answer the first one and we'll go back to the second. Again, as we mentioned when we were talking about the 1872 General Mining Act, there is no royalty set up for hard rock minerals. If, as the administration has expressed and as most people would probably agree with, the minerals in question here are really, really important and they require extra attention, it would seem to us now would be a really appropriate time, if not for all minerals and for these critical minerals in particular, for a royalty to be placed on development of these minerals.

Where iron was the primary metal, really iron and copper, in the early part of the 20th century, one could make an argument that these critical minerals are going to be those heavily extracted here in the coming decades. So now would be a really good time to place a royalty on those critical minerals again, if not all minerals at this time.

Now to answer your question about how do we clean up mines today. First of all, there is still policy that needs to be passed, legislative policy that needs to be passed to open up the door for more NGO, non-governmental organizations, and state mine remediation agencies to be able to legally perform certain types of mine cleanups. That's what we are referring to when we mention Good Samaritan legislation.

But with that aside, the mine cleanups that can occur now outside of those that are done by the federal government are really funded primarily with foundation money and that given through charitable donations as an example to Trout Unlimited. We perform mine cleanup work in the western United States and in coal country, West Virginia and so forth. And that's primarily funding that we receive through donations.

But there's also what's called 319 grant money and that's federal money that is made available to some of the state agencies and other NGOs who perform mine cleanup. We have a long ways to go and the only fund that is really available for mine cleanups is Superfund and that is only employed in the most egregious and toxic of situations. It's not appropriate for a small discharging mine or a small waste rock pile, but instead for a major toxic site that may exist. And money is put into the Superfund congressionally each year through the appropriations process.

The point of all that is we do not have a dedicated remediation fund outside of Superfund that only the EPA can use. And placing a royalty on critical minerals and or all minerals at this time would be really wise so that we do have a dedicated fund and we can get to work cleaning up the messes of the past. EPA estimates that there are about 500,000 abandoned mines in the western United States alone. And again, we already talked about 40% of headwaters being impacted by acid-like drainage.

**Marvin Cash (39:47):**
Yeah and so, you know, obviously we're talking about dealing with older abandoned mines but I was just kind of curious, you know, let's just say in recent history, you know, if you want to have a mine on public lands, do you have to bond or reserve for remediation? Or is that something that, you know, I guess for lack of a better word, charity in the federal government had basically subsidized?

**Ty Churchwell (40:12):**
Yeah, you know, that's a really important point to make. Mines that operate today operate under environmental laws, current environmental laws. You know, the Clean Water Act is there and the Federal Land Policy Management Act, et cetera, et cetera. There are sideboards on mining today and we certainly mine much, much more responsibly, certainly in terms of environmental damage today than we did even 75 to 140 years ago. So thank goodness we do have those sideboards.

That's not to say that there aren't impacts or that there aren't accidents or that there aren't impairments in a river as a function of some of those, but we do have those environmental laws in place. Again, as we embark on 21st century mining and in particular for these critical minerals, we are at a place right now at the starting line, if you will, where we can develop good policy around these minerals and the extraction of them in particular and where necessary. You couple that with good environmental policy in place and hopefully we can avoid the impact of the past. But it is important to note that talking about old abandoned legacy mines is really a completely different topic than modern day mines.

**Marvin Cash (41:33):**
Yeah, that's really helpful. And you mentioned earlier in the interview that, you know, really, you know, hunters and anglers are kind of the canaries in the coal mine on so many of these stewardship issues. And, you know, what do you do to translate the concern to non-hunters and anglers? You know, how do you get them to care about critical mineral extraction action?

**Ty Churchwell (41:53):**
Yeah, well, that's, again, part of the reason why we embarked on this campaign. Again, although mining reform advocates and some real notable traditional environmental groups may have this on their radar, it's generally a new topic for most people. And so, again, as we were in development of the tenets and the report in general and performing our outreach, we were intent on bringing all stakeholders into the conversation and leave it to hunters and anglers to really start to bring those groups together to impact policy moving forward.

So it is our intention, again, here on the starting blocks to really engage all stakeholders in this conversation going forward. As an example, we intend to convene something of a summit, if you will, in the coming months to start to bring all the people that we've already engaged to date and those who are just learning about this, get everybody in constituency groups at a table and start talking about what policy looks like so that we can make recommendations to those who have laws in D.C.

**Marvin Cash (43:10):**
Got it. And, you know, kind of an extension of that question, you know, you know, obviously COVID has had and continues to have a significant impact on not just the United States but, you know, the world. And then, you know, we've got an election coming up, been a, you know, got trade issues. I mean, there's a lot of turmoil in the current political climate. You know, how do you get folks to focus on one more cause?

**Ty Churchwell (43:37):**
Well, you make it personal. That's, again, part of the reason why we put that mapping tool together and made it available to the general public, is when you give somebody the opportunity to really dial down and look at an area or a place that's really near and dear to someone's heart, that's how you can get people's attention.

The report in general, just starting to have this conversation, I think is going to have an impact on people, whether there's turmoil in the world at the moment or not. You know, elections will take place. We'll move on from here, independent of who resides in the White House after that. We will still be embarked on this campaign. We will still be embarked in working with lawmakers in D.C. around crafting good policy, no matter who might be the person who signs the law or an act then into law.

So when you make it personal, when you really get people to understand that, hey, wait a minute, you mean the place where me and my grandpa have been elk hunting every fall for the last 30 years is in the crosshairs? You know, people start to pay attention. So, you know, the good thing about hunters and anglers is we're intimately in tune with those places where we hunt and fish. It's part of our soul I think in many cases. And in that sense, when you can start to point a finger at an area that someone holds dear and they see that there's a possible impact or a possible loss, people start to pay attention.

**Marvin Cash (45:20):**
Got it. And so if we have listeners listening to this interview that want to get involved, Ty, what's the best way for them to act and have the most impact?

**Ty Churchwell (45:29):**
Yeah, well, thank you for asking that. We do have a website and this is all in development. Again, we just released our report to the public yesterday and are starting to make people aware of this issue. So with that in mind, we do have a website that we've got created and it will be a place where there will be action alerts and updates and all kinds of documents moving forward.

The URL for that is tu.org forward slash critical mineral, one word, forward slash. Again, tu.org slash critical mineral slash. That is not the full report. There is a link to the full report from there but that's just sort of a landing place where people can keep an eye on the issue and get involved in that sense.

Simply being a member of Trout Unlimited or one of our partner organizations that put out the report with Backcountry Hunters and Anglers, with the National Wildlife Federation, these organizations at the national level are now embarked in this conversation and will be going forward. So while someone may not necessarily have the time or energy to pay attention at an intimate level, by being a member of one of these organizations, you do have the ability to know that someone is there looking out for your interest.

**Marvin Cash (46:55):**
Absolutely. And I will drop a link to that site in the show notes. And, you know, Ty, before I let you go tonight, why don't you let folks know where they can find you at TU? And, you know, I don't know, you've given us the website. Maybe there's some social media places they can go so they can kind of stay in the loop on what's going on with Critical Minerals as the campaign evolves.

**Ty Churchwell (47:17):**
Yeah, that's a great question. Again, those same three organizations are our other two partner organizations. All three of them are embarked on this campaign and there will be social media updates here and there. I think Trout Unlimited certainly will continue to play a lead role with this. This campaign really came from us and was something that we wanted to embark on.

So paying attention at tu.org is a really good place to do that. Certainly, I would make myself available if people want to have a place to ask questions, maybe they'd like to get more involved, be put onto an email list for future communications, they can do so at ty.churchwell.org.

**Marvin Cash (48:08):**
Well, that's awesome. Well, listen, Ty, I really appreciate you carving out some time to chat with me about it and I wish you all the luck with the campaign in the future.

**Ty Churchwell (48:14):**
Well, again, Marvin, we're really grateful to be here on The Articulate Fly and so much. We're really grateful for the opportunity to come and speak with your listeners. Again, as people pull up their cell phone tomorrow to check what the flow is on their favorite trout river and what the weather looks like before they head out, just remember that there are critical minerals in that phone and there is an impact to carrying that phone around in their pocket. So just good for everyone to know that Trout Unlimited makes this a high priority and that we're looking out for the best interest in the client.

**Marvin Cash (48:51):**
Absolutely. Thanks again.

Well, folks, I hope you enjoyed that as much as we enjoyed bringing it to you. Again, if you like the podcast, please tell a friend and please subscribe and leave us a review in the podcatcher of your choice. And don't forget to check out the links in the show notes for other ways to support the show. We really appreciate it. Tight lines, everybody.