The US Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report detailing the Department of the Interior (DOI) and the Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) efforts to reclaim and clean up abandoned hardrock mines. Abandoned mines pose significant environmental and physical safety risks to the public, which can cost millions or even billions of dollars to remediate. Between FY2017 and FY2021, DOI spent $109 million and USDA spent $10 million to reclaim abandoned hardrock mines. Furthermore, less than 3.4% of the $119 million spent was reimbursed by private parties, like former mine owners, meaning taxpayers covered $115 million of the bill. 

These costs are only expected to increase. The report details how there are currently more mines which require clean up than available funds to clean up the mines with. As of 2019, there were at least 140,000 known abandoned hardrock mines on federal lands, although GAO believes the true number of abandoned mines is likely closer to 530,000. In 2014, USDA estimated that between $4 billion and $6 billion would be needed to reclaim all abandoned hardrock mines on federal land. However, these estimates are outdated and, per GAO, likely inaccurate. According to the report, “USDA does not consistently track potential cleanup costs for abandoned hardrock mines in a manner that allows the agency to generate a more precise estimate.” This lack of accountability and transparency prevents policymakers from making informed decisions and adequately funding cleanup efforts. While DOI has made some recent progress in developing an inventory of abandoned hardrock mines, there is still much work to be done. 

TCS has repeatedly highlighted the impact of hardrock mine clean up, both as an environmental and financial cost to taxpayers. Unfortunately, the responsibility for cleanup efforts has largely been shouldered by federal taxpayers rather than the mining companies that profited from extracting publicly-owned resources. For more than 150 years, the General Mining Law of 1872 has allowed mining operations to extract valuable hardrock mineral resources – like gold, silver, uranium, etc. – from taxpayer owned lands without paying any royalty. In a testimony before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, TCS Vice President Autumn Hanna highlighted the billions of dollars given away by outdated mining laws, allowing multinational corporations to make massive profits without giving taxpayers a fair return.  

Industry must be held accountable for the mess they make when using our public lands. Orphaned oil and gas wells and abandoned mines are left behind by the extractive industry who profited from the natural resources they removed, yet taxpayers now have to foot the bill for their environmental liabilities. This new GAO report makes it abundantly clear that taxpayers are currently on the hook for the mess of the mining industry, with the mess being large enough to the point where government agencies cannot put a number on the bill. This is inexcusable and Congress must take action to protect taxpayers from the environmental liabilities left behind by the mining industry.