Catalyst with Shayle Kann - Giving tribes a stake in the critical minerals boom [partner content]

Episode Date: October 8, 2024

Tannice McCoy grew up in a mining family, but she never imagined herself in the mining business. Today she’s the president and general manager of NewRange Copper Nickel. Jenna Lehti never imagined herself in the mining industry either. She’s a member of the Bois Forte band of the Ojibwe tribe in Northern Minnesota, and grew up on a reservation adjacent to the Iron Range, a collection of mining districts around Lake Superior. Today, she’s the tribal relations advisor for NewRange. Together, they’re taking a proactive approach to harnessing tribal support for the critical minerals boom. NewRange is a Minnesota company pursuing a new copper, nickel, and cobalt mine in the northeastern part of the state, called NorthMet. It would supply minerals for a wide range of clean energy technologies. But under a previous owner, the project faced setbacks – in part because of a lack of engagement with local tribes.  “I think part of that came from a lack of understanding of the tribe's sovereignty and their water quality standards,” said McCoy. In this episode, produced in collaboration with NewRange, Tannice McCoy and Jenna Lehti sit down with Stephen Lacey. They explain what has changed with the NorthMet project, the importance of working with tribes, and the future of critical minerals mining in America. “It's really about how we are partnering with the tribes to move forward and progress,” said Lehti. This episode was produced in collaboration with NewRange Copper Nickel.

This is a branded podcast from Latitude Studios. Tannis McCoy grew up in a mining family. Both her grandfathers and her dad worked in mining. Mining definitely is a boom or bust industry, or that's how I felt like it was growing up. And I often referred to it as it was either hot dogs or caviar because of the cyclical nature of mining. Mining wasn't just cyclical. It could be dangerous.

Yeah, my dad was in a particularly bad accident when I was 13. basically a near-death accident. He had lots of bad side effects from it and multiple surgeries, but he did go back in. Tannis had no interest in carrying on the family mining tradition. But in the early 2000s, a few years after graduating from the British Columbia Institute of Technology, she got a chance to work on a new kind of hydrometalurgy,

an environmentally friendly alternative to smelting. I totally didn't want to get into mining, but in happenstance, fell into it through research and development, and then just fell in love with it. and, like, worked my way up. Jenna Lettie didn't grow up in a mining family, but the mines were always in the background. So I think people are surprised when they hear I grew up near the Iron Range,

but have no history in mining. Jenna is a member of the Boyce Fort Band of Chippewa, or the Ojibway of northern Minnesota. The reservation she grew up on is adjacent to the Iron Range, a collection of mining districts around Lake Superior. Her people, her tribe, have been there for centuries. Our people traveled there. they were told to travel until they found where food grows on the water.

And so they landed in Net Lake, which is one sector of our reservation, where there's wild rice, which is food that grows on the water. They also discovered vast mineral deposits. Northern Minnesota is rich in iron, copper, nickel, and cobal. But these mines have encroached on traditional hunting lands, causing deep concern about their environmental and cultural impact. And the economic impact has been spotty. I mean, there was a little bit of kind of the boom and bust that Tannis talked about, because the boom and bust would affect the economy of the tribe to some degree.

Like if it's caviar season, to go back to Tanis's metaphor, you know, we felt that in our tribal businesses. If it's hot dog season, we felt that as well. Tanis and Jenna worked together at New Range Copper Nickel, a Minnesota company pursuing a new critical minerals mine in the northeastern part of the state. It would supply multiple critical minerals for a wide range of clean energy technologies. Tanis is the president and general manager. Jenna is the tribal relations advisor, the first person to have this role. New Range took the project over from another company, Polymet, in 2023. And right away, it took a different approach. The hiring of Jenna was important. It was important to the company, but important to myself

as well. There wasn't enough tribal engagement, I think, by the previous company or in the U.S. in general. Jenna had previously held leadership positions with her tribe and with the state as a tribal liaison. So when she got a call from a New Range recruiter, she reached out to her tribal contacts. Just to get a feel for what they thought of the position and the feedback I got was that they were excited. We have a lot of liaisons at the state level and we have them at the federal level. And they're making a huge impact on the tribes and on tribal people. And so to see that spread into the private industry was exciting for tribal leadership. But as Jenna was interviewing for the job with Tannis, a massive development unfolded for the project.

Months after the Biden administration dealt a death blow to twin metals plans for a copper-nickel mine in northern Minnesota, today it was the project formerly known as Polymet's turn. Yeah, I was interviewing Jenna, and then our 404 permit was revoked at the exact time I was interviewing her. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers late today revoked a permit for the proposed North Met mine, previously known as Polymet. New Range will now have to submit a new permit application. And I think part of that revocation came from a lack of understanding the tribe's sovereignty and their water quality standards. And so it just reinforced that this was a position that was needed in our company so we could start to build the bridges between industry and the tribes. There had been a long simmering dispute between a local tribe and the previous owner over the proposed mine's downstream environmental impact. A new range under Tannis's leadership

was already planning to deploy a new team's global expertise with the goal of building a world-class cutting-edge project. Frankly, I didn't quite understand, I think, what that impact was going to be when Tannis told me what was happening. And then really during that process, getting to know Tannis, and as she alluded to how things are done with First Nations in Canada, and understanding what she wanted to do here with the company was really what was important to me. It's really about how do we partner with the tribes and move forward together.

We should be able to impact them in a positive. light rather than a negative light. And I think we're doing that with the environmental safeguards we're putting in on this project. But I also think it's important that we hear where their concerns are and how we can address those concerns. In this episode, producing collaboration with New Range, Tanis McCoy and Jenna Laitie sit down with Stephen Lacey. They explain how New Range is rethinking how mining projects engage with local communities, the importance of working with tribes, and the future of critical minerals mining in America. Mining was marred by a bad track record. I will admit that readily. But I think doing it here in North America means that we're

set to more stringent standards than most other areas. So what it means supplying, you know, using our resources, our people to bring that and produce it within our own economy rather than getting it elsewhere. Now, it may surprise some people listening that Minnesota is home to huge reserves of critical minerals in the U.S. What kind of resources does the state have, Tannis? So there's been mining for 120 years of Tachanite, which has been big. But the Duluth complex, actually, where New Range is located, which is in northeastern Minnesota, contains 95% of America's nickel, 88% of cobalts and 33% of our copper. So New Range has one of the world's largest undeveloped resources. And new range copper nickel is looking to mine this copper nickel

cobalt. How much could these resources theoretically supply? So there's enough copper to build 2.6 terawatts of wind capacity. Copper is important because it's used to create conduct and store energy and it's found extensively in wind turbine, solar arrays, electric vehicles, and medical devices. There's enough nickel to build 35 million EVs. But more important than those statistics is the context. It's no secret that the U.S. is reliant on foreign countries for these and many other clean energy minerals. So we want to strengthen our energy security if we want to have control over our ability to cut emissions and decarbonize, and if we want to control our ability to compete in the global economy. Now, this project builds upon years.

of work, as we alluded to in the opening story. That project was previously stalled because of disputes over tribal impacts, over environmental impacts. Can you talk in more detail about some of those concerns and how they're informing new ranges approach going forward? I think as the permitted former PolyMet project, it was permitted with all the safeguards in place. I think that we just took a step back and were able to listen to some of the community tribal concerns. that came up during the environmental impact community consultations and just look back and say, well, what can we do better? And one of those was tailings was a large concern,

the construction method that was being used. And so I think our main focus here is to make sure that we're always meeting but really exceeding environmental standards with what we plan to construct and how we're going to move forward with that. How has that materially changed the project? Are there major initiatives that you're, undertaking that we're not in place before in terms of environmental cleanup or controls? Yep. So even right now, we're currently cleaning up what was the processing facility there.

So that's like quarter of a mile long building. And we've recycled all of the infrastructure that was there. So that includes the mills, steel, concrete, rebar, all of it is being recycled, which is, which is good. That cleans up that facility. And then again, with tailings, we're exploring options where we can immediately start reclaiming the land, which is looking at potential input disposal, looking at water treatment. But mainly we really do, as we mine, we want to, you know, be cleaning up the site as we move forward. Jenna, talk about some of the tribal concerns and more detailed with the way the Polymet project was handled. And then how did those inform some of the changes that you're working on? Sure. So really the concerns were around

water quality. And then there was also what I keep referring to and Tannis alluded to earlier as as a relationship deficit. So I think there's just there's cultural differences and how business is typically done across the country and then how tribes do business, which I think creates problems and can lead to like a relationship deficit. We're working to to build everything from the ground up and that starts really with with a strong foundation. And so the foundation that we're building is just built on listening to the tribes. You know, from my my experience, no matter kind of where you're working, if you don't take time to genuinely listen to people, then your foundation is built on shaky ground, right? Like your building's going to topple.

And then from listening, there has to do that accountability and trust. So we listen to the tribes. And now we're following through on some of those promises to tribal leadership. So there was there was a request to provide more training to tribal leadership and staff so they could really better understand the mining industry and mining operations. And there was also a request to provide more training to industry on tribes. I hear quite often, especially when I worked at the state from people, that they didn't know we had 11 tribes in the state of Minnesota, and they grew up here their whole life. And so one of the requests from tribal leadership was to provide more of that history to industry. And so that's something we're partnering with a tribal member from one of the tribes of Minnesota to provide training to all of new range employees as well as contract on tribal history.

all those important things to understand, hopefully get people to better understand tribes. What are you hearing from tribal leaders as you undertake this new approach? I think, you know, they've heard promises before from industry and then there wasn't follow through in a lot of cases. And so, you know, I take it very seriously

that the tribes and tribal leadership is willing to sort of put themselves out there again. Like I mentioned before, tribal leadership was excited to see this liaison on-type role expand from a state and federal space out into industry. And so I think excitement is another piece of it. But certainly it comes down to, they've heard this before. We have a history of broken promises. And so it's just really important to me to make sure that we're following through and not letting tribal leadership down as we move forward. Yeah, Tannis, that history of

broken promises is so critical. Like, how important is that to you to follow through on all this stuff. I think it's key and paramount for us to be able to build that relationship. If we, if we continue to say things and then not follow through, well, trust can't be built. And trust isn't built overnight. And it's something that we'll work on to prove. But one of the things we do do is we track everything that we say that we're going to do and we have follow up to make sure that it's being done. Sometimes the timeline might not be quite met the way we thought or we thought it could move faster than what it would. But like, as Jenna said, even this training, we promised we would do that. It's taking a little bit longer to put it together. But I'm excited to, to roll that out.

But I think the most important piece is tracking it and making sure you follow through. This is such an interesting time for mining in America because we need so many more critical minerals to support the scale up of clean energy solutions. And we need to support new mining operations, but we also need to uphold strong standards for protecting the environment and local communities. And it obviously creates this tension. We want to move quickly. We want to do it right. Tannis, how do we strike that balance between harnessing America's domestic resources so that we can support domestic clean energy climate technologies and doing it right while we're doing it quickly. It is important because if we look at, you know, hitting, hitting goals or the 2040

goals that are in Minnesota, where else are we going to get these minerals from? We can get them from other countries, but we have them here and we have standards that we can uphold. And we do that through research, through technology development. And that's what today's mining industry is. It really is research-driven, high-tech and increasingly automated. And I think we just need, to be able to marry concerns from tribal communities, from communities, and then deploy those technologies to solve them. Jenna, what do you think about striking that balance? These resources are absolutely critical for scaling climate-positive technologies, but they can

still have a negative impact if not done right. So how do you think about that balance? Yeah. I think creating space for the tribal voices is key, right? There has to be the representation. There needs to be two-way dialogue and a willingness to have difficult conversations. And I think there has to be genuine recognition that the tribes really do bring value in the conversation when they're included and then moving forward together, continuing that conversation. But there has to be, again, that genuine recognition of the

value that tribes bring when they're included in the process. Tannis, what do you think the mining industry is going to look like in this country as we race to achieve these net zero targets in the most sustainable way possible with domestic resources? I think the mining industry moving into the future is going to be more of an education piece than it is right now. I think that's one of one area in industry that we haven't done a good job with. Instead of we kind of have hidden our heads in the sand a little bit to to quietly go about things, but I think that's going to change. You're going to see it to be really inclusive. It'll be research and data driven. It's going to bring people to work and the world can't achieve clean energy goals without mining. So, you know, if it can't be grown, it must be mine.

So I think we just need to do a good job of marrying everything together. What do you think your grandfather would say about the mining industry today? Would he recognize it? I think he would in some kind of way. But, I mean, it's completely changed. Obviously, health and safety standards have changed. And I think he was always proud to be part of that industry. So I think he would continue to be proud that I'm in this industry

and that we're continuing to make it better. Jenna, what gives you the most motivation to show up and do this engagement? work. This is this is what what our ancestors wanted, right? Like, this is what tribal people have wanted what they've been fighting for. Yeah, I live on the reservation, majority of 99% of my life. And I'm married to a band member. My kids are band members. And it's a, it's a fight, right? Like, we were the first people and been brushed aside and had all these terrible things happen. And so this is what, like, I'm the result of my ancestors fighting. Like, that's why I'm here. and that's not something to squander.

There's a lot of tribal people that aren't here because of terrible things that happened, but I get to be here and it's not something to squander. So I think having that purpose that it's important. Like the impact that industry can have on tribal people is huge, negative or positive. And so how do we take this opportunity and make it better for tribal communities and for seven generations coming? and it's bigger than just these tribes, right? Like, can we set a new standard

and how industry works with tribal nations in this country to make it better for tribal people all across the country? So it's a super important purpose, I think, every single day. And so it's easy to keep going. New Range Copper Nickel is working to strengthen America's energy security and create a domestic supply of critical minerals, copper, nickel, and cobalt for the low-carbon transition through responsible mining.

ensuring Minnesotans and the nation benefit from a world-class cutting-edge project on one of the world's largest undeveloped copper and nickel resources. For more information on the company's plans, visit new range coppernickel.com or visit the link in the show notes.