Wisconsin Repeals Decades-Old Sulfide-Ore Mining Ban

Sulfide-ore mining could return to Wisconsin in 2018 as the result of the lifting of a 20-year mining moratorium.

Gov. Scott Walker (R) signed Dec. 11 a bill (A.B. 499) repealing a 1997 statute commonly known as the “prove it first” law, which effectively halted sulfide-ore mining in the state for two decades.

Critics of the new law said lifting the mining moratorium is one more example of the Walker administration’s push, with legislators’ help, to boost economic expansion without adequate regard to the environment. State legislators also are considering additional bills to roll ...