by Amber Reimondo, Energy Director
In 1986, the federal government analyzed the "Impacts on Indian Religious Concerns" related to the proposed Canyon Mine, a uranium mine near the Grand Canyon.
It found that: "Construction and operation of the Canyon Mine will have no impact on Indian lands in northern Arizona." It went on to claim that, "After communications and consultation with Hopi and Havasupai Tribal leaders and experts on Indian religious sites and practices as well as an archeological (sic) investigation of the mine site, no specific Indian sacred or religious sites have been identified near the mine site. The Tribes maintain that Indian religious interests will be adversely affected but have not identified specific sites which are threatened."
The U.S. government has long overlooked and oversimplified Indigenous concerns, viewing impacts to the environment through a narrow and non-inclusive lens.
A new report published earlier this month by the United States Geological Survey, co-authored by former Havasupai Tribal Councilwoman Carletta Tilousi and scientist Jo Ellen Hinck, expands how the U.S. government agency looks at risks posed by uranium mining in the Grand Canyon region to include perspectives from the Havasupai Tribe.
This is such an important step because, in general, government analyses of impacts from operations like mines have long been Eurocentric and have not reflected the risks faced by the Havasupai or other Native American tribes who use and think of the land differently. This report starts to change that.
The Havasupai Tribe and other Native peoples of the Grand Canyon region have long opposed uranium mining in the area, citing, among other things, risks to water, health, animals, plants, and cultural sites, as well as to Indigenous beliefs and lifeways.
This is especially true for Canyon Mine (renamed Pinyon Plain Mine in 2020), on ancestral lands near the Havasupai Tribe's sacred mountain, Red Butte, south of Grand Canyon National Park and inside the newly designated Baaj Nwaavjo I'tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument. The mine began extracting uranium in December 2023 for the first time in its 38-year history.
"We have a belief system that they don’t understand," says Tilousi in the report. "In our stories...where the mine is located is Mother Earth’s lungs. So when they dug the mine shaft, they punctured her lungs."
In 2016, the mine also punctured a perched aquifer and millions of gallons of water containing high levels of contaminants like uranium and arsenic have been pumped out of the mine shaft every year since.
But the way the U.S. Geological Survey and other government agencies study or consider exposure risks from uranium mining has largely ignored Indigenous knowledge and realities, including ways that tribal communities are exposed, until now.
The 18-page report is packed with important information and I'd highly recommend reading it in full. Here are a few highlights, to get you started.
Contaminant exposure framework for uranium mining in the Grand Canyon region from the Havasupai perspective. UNITED STATES GEOLOGICAL SURVEY
The report rolls out an updated framework, in both English and Havasupai, for understanding ways that tribal communities may be exposed to contaminants from uranium mining in addition to the types of exposure pathways typically recognized by western science.
For example, the new framework considers not only what humans and animals are eating, breathing, and drinking near Canyon Mine, but also includes Havasupai traditional uses like harvesting elk, mule deer, porcupine, and black-tailed jackrabbits, as well as pinyon nuts and yucca for food, and gathering medicinal and ceremonial plants like sage, and body and face-painting materials like red ochre and charcoal.
Whereas before the U.S. Geological Survey might have simply studied exposure that might happen from eating hunted game, now it will look at ways Havasupai people might be exposed due to cultural practices, like preparing deer hides.
According to the report, "the Havasupai have long been known for the quality of their tanned deer-hides...Traditional hide processing includes hand and mouth contact with deer organs and fluids, which could expose hunters to contaminants in the animal."
Importantly, the paper also explains that things like toxicity thresholds often used in western science may have no relevance to the Havasupai who feel an impact at the introduction of any level of toxicity. For the Havasupai, there is no acceptable level of contamination.
According to the report, "Common risk assessment approaches attempt to quantify the risk by applying hazard quotients or setting protective toxicity thresholds, indicating that some degree of change or loss is acceptable. Such an approach may be deemed irrelevant by Tribal communities; for example, the Havasupai have changed certain traditional behaviors to mitigate exposure based on their risk perspective to mining near Red Butte."
Other concerns about ways Havasupai people could be exposed to contaminants from uranium mining include inhaling steam from water vapor and exposure to particulates from burning sage in traditional sweat lodges for blessings, healing, and prayer, and absorbing contaminants through their skin after applying body and face paints.
While the report is careful to point out that the updated framework simply identifies ways people are concerned about being exposed to contamination, but does not confirm or quantify actual exposure, simply including Havasupai perspectives represents an important step forward. It recognizes some of the ways that Native people have lived since time immemorial and continue to practice their traditional lifeways in the region.
The expanded risk framework represents eight years of knowledge-sharing by the Havasupai Tribe. From 2015 until 2022, Havasupai elders, members of the Havasupai Tribal Council, and tribal members selected by the tribe shared knowledge during formal meetings, site visits, and virtual teleconferences.
The final report was reviewed and approved by the Havasupai Tribal Council, which granted permission for Havasupai names, culture, language, and history to be publicly shared.
As a result, how the U.S. Geological Survey thinks about and studies possible risks posed by uranium mining contamination in the Grand Canyon region can finally begin to consider how mining impacts the environment, food, belief systems, and ceremony from a Havasupai perspective. And hopefully it signals a broader shift toward incorporating Indigenous knowledge into other environmental analyses as well, better reflecting the true risks and impacts of development on Indigenous communities.
READ THE FULL REPORT: Expanded Conceptual Risk Framework for Uranium Mining in Grand Canyon Watershed—Inclusion of the Havasupai Tribe Perspective ›
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