Word: hopi
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Peabody, the world's largest private coal company, has used the slurry pipeline to move its coal since 1970. Traditionalists in the Hopi tribe have complained that both the coal mining and water pumping violate their religious obligation to act as guardians of the land and its water, which Naseyowna calls "the blood of the earth." The dispute has heated up in recent months as concern over the springs and wells has grown--and as deadlines approach for key negotiations between Peabody and the Mohave power plant...
Peabody's fuel-supply contract with the Mohave Generating Station ends in 2005. But the power plant is required to start installing scrubbers on its smokestacks before then, and its executives do not want to spend $400 million on that project unless the Hopi water problem is resolved. Either Washington gives Peabody permission to pump aquifer water for the life of the mine, which could be an additional 15 years, or an alternative water source must be found for the slurry pipeline. "We have to decide by next year," says Nader Mansour, manager for environmental regulations for Southern California Edison...
Peabody executives have stepped up efforts to reach an agreement since June, when CEO Irl Engelhardt, 54, met with Hopi and Navajo leaders in Flagstaff, Ariz. "We're not happy about the continuing controversy over the water," says Fred Palmer, a Peabody executive vice president. "We'd like to see it resolved...
...Natural Resources Defense Council last year funded a hydrological study of the aquifer that found the water level in some of the Hopi wells had fallen 100 ft. since mining began, and the flows from most of its springs had been reduced 50%. Peabody cites its own extensive studies and argues that the water it draws from the aquifer is comparable to dipping "half a beverage can out of a 55-gal. drum." But Palmer says that Peabody "does accept that the aquifer has religious significance...
...aquifer and the coal also have huge economic significance for the tribe. Payments from Peabody account for three-fourths of the tribal council's $19 million annual budget, which pays for services like schools and health clinics and salaries for about 500 council employees. Hopi tribal chairman Wayne Taylor Jr. bluntly concedes that "basically, we don't have an economy. We've become dependent on the Peabody income...