Vancouver’s Quaterra Resources Inc. (TSX V:QTA)(NYSE:QMM), together with the board of supervisors of Mohave County in Arizona, has filed a lawsuit in Arizona’s U.S. District Court against the US Department of the Interior and the Bureau of Land Management.
The basis of the lawsuit is that the U.S. government, through the Secretary of the Interior and the Bureau of Land Management, did not adhere to mandated statutory procedures when it issued a decision to close more than one million acres of federal land to all mining in Northern Arizona.
The suit alleges “that the facts and science demonstrated that mining would not harm the Grand Canyon watershed and that the withdrawal of federal lands regardless of this evidence was arbitrary and capricious; the decision arbitrarily withdraws over one million acres to address subjective sensibilities which enjoy no legal protection; the secretary did not comply with the procedural requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act; and the secretary did not address scientific controversies and failed to co-ordinate with local governments in making his decision.”
Quaterra and its co-plaintiff are seeking a declaration that the withdrawal order is unlawful and a permanent injunction against any aspects of the withdrawal.
According to Quaterra, a decision that finds the secretary failed to follow the criteria and procedures for a withdrawal and sets the withdrawal aside would allow the company to develop the mineral deposits that it has lawfully claimed and worked.
Quaterra holds 1,000 mineral claims in the Arizona Strip where it has spent approximately $12 million to fund the costs of exploration and development work.
The co-plaintiff, board of supervisors, Mohave County, Arizona, alleges in the suit that uranium mining, if allowed to proceed, would contribute $168 million to Arizona over a 42-year period from severance taxes alone. Corporate and individual income tax revenue would contribute another $2 billion over the same time period.
