ElSalvador'sgold mine dilemma
SAN ISIDRO, El Salvador — Somewhere trapped in the earth below Francisco Pineda’s feet is an estimated 1.4 million ounces of gold. Pineda wants it to remain there.
He doesn’t want an Australian mining company to dig up the precious metal.
“What will happen with the water? To separate the gold and silver, they’ll use cyanide. This will eitherfilter into the water table or go into the river,” said Pineda, who is an internationally known environmental activist.
The mine is located near the source of the Lempa River, the nation’s most important waterway.
There are many inEl Salvador who share Pineda’s views. They say their densely populated nation cannot absorb the environmental damage that would result from mining.
Yet the choice is not theirs — just as it's not up to the Salvadoran government, which opposes the mining.
A Far-Away Decision
The fate of the El Dorado gold mine will not be decided anywhere near this tiny Central American country. Rather, it’s being weighed by a three-judge tribunal, or court, based in Washington, D.C.
The little-known court is formallycalled the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes. Last month, it heard eight days of arguments over whether the Australian company OceanaGold isentitled to mine in El Salvador despite a government ban. Sometime early in 2015, the tribunal will issue its ruling.
The unusual case is a sign of the effect international business laws are having. They are allowing companies to sue foreign governments they believe are limiting their future profits. Critics say such laws are giving tribunals power over entire countries and their leaders.
The lawsuit brought by OceanaGoldcould put El Salvador in a no-win situation: Either allow OceanaGold to mine or pay the company the $301 million it says it would have earned from the gold.
“For us, it is very tough that three judges will be deciding this case. They’ve never been here. They’ve never asked us what we want. It is really ugly that someone is deciding our future without asking our opinion,” Pineda said.
Company Calls The Ban "Unjustified"
Suspicions run deep over the project, which has led to violence. Four mining opponents were killed between 2009 and 2011, and their cases have yet to be resolved.
The Australian company now at thecenter of the conflict is a latecomer. Late last year, OceanaGold bought a Canadian company, Pacific Rim, that had explored El Dorado.
OceanaGold says it can meet the strictest environmental standards.
According to company spokeswoman Andrea Atell, the mining operation can recycle a large portion of the water it uses.
OceanaGold argued that El Salvadorimposed an “unjustified ban” on metal mining in 2008. It called the ban a “gross misuse of authority” that ignored an earlier Salvadoran law passed in 1999. Under the earlier law the first company, Pacific Rim, had spent tens of millions of dollars exploring for gold.
President Is Against Any Mining
Pacific Rim entered El Salvador in 2002. The president at the time was in favor of the mine. The company’s lawyers told the tribunal that activists opposed to the mine deliberately lied to frighten the people of El Salvador. For example, the lawyers said activists claimed the company woulduse 2 tons of cyanide a day and that the pollution would make women unable to have children.
The current president of El Salvadorand the two before him have all enforced a ban on mining.
President Salvador Sanchez Ceren flatly rejects mining. “Everyone says that El Salvador has a wealth underground, having golden valleys and basins of silver,” he said. “But what does it mean if we allow it to be removed? It will destroy our lives.”
Still, there are people in the small city of San Isidro who would like the jobs that come with a working mine.
“Let them come here,” said Gilberto Vasquez Ramos, a city council member. “Yes, it might damage the environment a little bit, but the government can regulate this — if they do damage, they’ll have to pay the fine.”
Setting A Bad Example
El Salvador government lawyer Luis A. Parada said Pacific Rim had never obtained a mining license or fully followed Salvadoran mining law.
The big question, Parada said, is whether a foreign company should have to follow the laws of the country in which it is operating. Is it really fair, he asked, for a country to have to change its laws to satisfy a foreign company?
If OceanaGold were to win, he added, it would set a very bad example. It would, he said, encourage "other companies toforce other countries to get what they want.”
Based on the article, find TWO words that you did not know. Write the sentence that the word was found in. Then, use context clues to try to define the word.
Word / Sentence the word was found in / Context clues definition of wordBased on the article, write two comprehension questions.
Question #1:Question #2:
Based on the article, write one critical thinking question. (Hint: This should start with How or Why)
Question #3:Answer the following question using the RACE strategy: How do people impact the world that they live in?
What if the rain forest ran out of rain?
Deforestation of the Amazon gets a large amount of attention and scientists are worried about that, but they are also worried about something just as important. Thefreshwaterecosystems in the Amazon basin need protection, too.
The Amazon isthe world's largest remaining rain forest. It is home to one of the greatest varieties ofplants and animals on Earth. It covers 2.1 million square miles of land. The Amazon is shared by Brazil, Peru, Colombia and six other countries.The whole areacovers40 percent of South America, which is one of the world's seven continents.
World's Largest Water Network At Risk
Freshwater ecosystems are bodies of water where plants and animals interact with their environment. Scientists say they are critical tothe health of the Amazon basin. The basin is the largestnetwork of rivers, streams and lakes in the world.It covers over 2.6 million square miles and funnels water into the 4,000-mile-long Amazon River.
The plants and animals that make their homes in the Amazon are facing a number of threats. In themagazine Global Change Biology, scientists recently wrote that finding better ways to protect the water systems is especially important. They say the people who live there need protection, along with the plants and animals.
Leandro Castello is a professor at Virginia TechUniversity. He helped write the article. He used to work on fish conservation in the Amazon. Castello says he was disappointedin how much more attention was paid to the rain forest's trees than its water systems.
Freshwater ecosystems in the Amazon provide many crucial services to the plants, animals and people who live there. The ecosystems move water through the rain forest, cycle soil and regulate microclimates, spots where the climate is different from the other areas nearby. The water systems are also home to a variety of plants and animals, including thousands of fish species. In addition, people who live in the Amazon need the ecosystems for food and water.In spite of their importance, the freshwater ecosystems are in trouble.
Damage From Too Many Dams
One cause of the troubles is a change in hydrology or theway water moves around.Castello says that kind of change is one of the worst things for a freshwater ecosystem.
"If you change the amount of water in either a lake or river or stream, you will change a lot of processes," Castello says.
Dams change hydrology by interrupting natural water flow and collecting water in reservoirs. When that happens, fish and other animals cannot move through the water and nutrients in the water cannot move downstream. Studies show that damming is not only a threat to people who make their living by fishing, but also a threat to people who eat the fish.
There are many dams in the Amazon basin already, andmore are planned. In the magazine, scientists say that if all the new dams are built, only three rivers will be left untouched.
Mining Pollution, Deforestation Danger
Mining can also change water systems. Gold mining oftenremoves sand and mud from the bottom of rivers and streams. The process can alter river beds and introduce pollutants such as heavy metals into the water.
In addition to dams and mining, deforestation is one of the most serious threats to freshwater ecosystems.Trees perform an important stepof the water cycle, Castello says. Trees take water from the soil and let it evaporate through their leaves.When there are fewer trees to do this, water trickles back into the rivers, bringing soil with it.
Deforestation can also reduce rainfall and make droughts worse. In addition, plants and trees are important for the soil structure on land. Removing them can cause soil to wash into the water and even reshape rivers and streams.
Hotter Climate, Fewer Streams
Climate change, the heating up of the Earth's climate, may add another problem. As temperatures in the Amazon basin go up, droughts and severe storms may become more frequent and intense. Drier conditions may also lower water levels in rivers, and some streams might disappear completely.
Castello says that the key to better conservation is for lawmakers to develop a plan that includes both land and freshwater ecosystems. He also says that satellites could be useful for monitoring freshwater ecosystems in the Amazon. Satellites already help governments track illegal deforestation.
Scientists also say that although much of the Amazon is protected, many freshwater areas are not. Some freshwater ecosystems are even in protected areas, but they're still affected by dams outside their boundaries. There are also exceptions in the rules to allow activities such as mining.
Scientists Urge Conservation Across Borders
Marcia Macedo is a scientist with the Woods Hole Research Center in Massachusetts. She also helped write the article. She says policymakers should consider how effects from development projects like dams do not stay in one place.
"You have the impacts moving downstream in the river, across official boundaries, across state and country lines," Macedo says.
Claudio Maretti works for a conservation organization in Brazil.
"The most important thing is to build the information across borders," Maretti says. If countries have the same rules and policies, theycando abetter job of protecting species andecosystems, he believes.
Based on the article, find TWO words that you did not know. Write the sentence that the word was found in. Then, use context clues to try to define the word.
Word / Sentence the word was found in / Context clues definition of wordBased on the article, write two comprehension questions.
Question #1:Question #2:
Based on the article, write one critical thinking question. (Hint: This should start with How or Why)
Question #3:Answer the following question using the RACE strategy: How do people impact the world that they live in?
Panama Canal expansion project makes room for megaships, new business
PANAMA CITY, Panama — More than 100 years ago the SS Ancon sailed into the history books as the first ship to cross the Panama Canal. The canal was built by the U.S., and the area around the canal,the Panama Canal Zone, was under the control of the U.S. for many years.The waterway was seen as a display of American ingenuity and engineering skill.
The Panama Canal cuts across Panama. It was created so that ships could get from one side of the Americas to the other without having to sail all the way down to the tip of South America.
Updating The Highway OfThe Sea
The United States completely withdrew from the canal on Dec. 31, 1999. There was barely any U.S. participation in the recent $5.5 billion canal project, which will allow the world’s bigger ships to cross Panama’s“highway of the sea.” The project was meant to expand the canal so bigger ships could fit through it. The ship making the first official trip through the newly expanded canal Sunday will be a Chinese megaship.
Part of this project has been building new locks. Locks are devices that are used to raise or lower boats. The canal is not the same elevation throughout, so the locks are necessary for ships to pass through the canal. The new locks are an engineering marvel, as they are almost as tallas an 11-story building. The project is expected to double the canal’s capacity. However, it’s been a long slog. The project is being delivered nearly two years behind schedule. Additionally, claims made by the international organization that built the project could push the price for the project even higher.
But now — 110 million hours of work, 292,000 tons of structural steel, 1.6 million tons of cement and 5 million cubic meters of concrete later— the project is finished. Panamanians voted to approve it in 2006.
“This is a great project from an engineering and logistical point of view,” said Giuseppe Quarta. He is the chief executive of the organization that worked on the project.
The project got underway in 2007. It included deepening and widening the entrances to the canal, widening and deepening the navigational channels, and raising the level of certain parts. It also involved building larger Atlantic and Pacific locks that are as long as three Empire State Buildings laid end to end.
Expanded Canal Will Expand International Trade Options
The original canal, built at great cost in money and human lives, is simply too small to handle the bigger ships now traveling the world’s traderoutes. Smaller ships will continue to use the original locks. The old and new locks share much of the original canal route.
With the canal now able to handle longer, wider and heavier ships, the canal authority hopes to win back shipping lines. Many had switched tothe Suez Canal in North Africa or used U.S. West Coast ports because their ships couldn’t fit through the original locks from1914.
Panama Canal Administrator Jorge Quijano said that Panama is beginning a new era. This is an era“that will change the face of global shipping and international commerce.”
Celebrating The Project's Completion
Panama’s President Juan Carlos Varela will preside over a ceremony celebrating those who worked on the project. Then the Chinese ship willproceed to the main event on the Pacific side of the canal.
Prominent people from around the world are expectedto mark the inaugural passage. The next day, the new locks will open for regular commercial traffic. Already, shipping lines have made more than 120 reservations for the new locks.
The timing for delivery of the project hasn’t been great. Drought has caused low water levels and hampered shipping operations through the canal this year. Because China manufactures so many products, a slowdown in business in China has also taken a toll.
Meanwhile, the delays in completion of the project have given U.S. East Coast ports and other ports around the Americas more time to complete dredging and other improvements so that the big ships transiting the canal can enter their shipping channels fully loaded.
A Coveted Economic Position BetweenTwo Oceans
In Panama, the canal is the economic lifebloodof the country that sits between two oceans. This project has also become a hugesource of pride for Panamanians.
“The canal is the advantage that Panama hasover everyone — and it always will,” said Philip Nichols, a business professor at the University of Pennsylvania. “They know they have an income, no matter what."
Beyond just going from the West Coast to theEast Coast, a lot of cargo also goes south to Latin American countries.
“Panama is a natural trans-shipment hub,” saidBenitez.
Although the paint is barely dry on the new locks, the Panama Canal Authority is already considering building another larger set of locks. Ships too big to fit through the new locks are already being built.
Based on the article, find TWO words that you did not know. Write the sentence that the word was found in. Then, use context clues to try to define the word.
Word / Sentence the word was found in / Context clues definition of wordBased on the article, write two comprehension questions.
Question #1:Question #2:
Based on the article, write one critical thinking question. (Hint: This should start with How or Why)
Question #3:Answer the following question using the RACE strategy: How do people impact the world that they live in?