Operation Battery Ore and fight against climate change
My family has lived around the Kitkajoki river for as long as there are written records and very likely even before that. My grandmother was born by the river, so was her mother and father and their parents. My grandfather was born close by on another river called Kuusinkijoki that is part of the same river system as Kitkajoki and connects to it after the Finnish-Russian border. I have been coming and going to this area since I was born. I don’t know how young I was when I was here for the first time, probably not even a year old. The blood of my grandparents, my mother and me, our collective family memories and shared genes ties us here. Snippets of DNA strands like hair, parts of my body, memories and my mind make me sometimes resonate with the place in ways that no other place in the world.
Today these areas of the former Kitka Siida are of interest to a foreign mining company. An Australian mining company is doing test drilling next to the River Kitkajoki seeking gold and cobalt. Another company is seeking diamonds east from the popular Ruka ski resort. New outsiders who want to claim the lands, get the treasures hidden and get rich. The people who currently own the land don’t have any rights to stop this.
The mining project at the Kitkajoki is planned around an old test mine of Juomasuo just under 1 km from the river and 10 km from Ruka. The mining project is located uphill from Kitkajoki so if the mine is established all its runoff waters will drain to this clear watered river. There is an old test mine already in the area. It is filled with water that has turned turquoise resembling tropical lagoons. I have never seen water like this in Kuusamo or in Finland. The place smells of sulphur and the radiation levels at certain places are as high as Chernobyl. According to studies made in the 90’s the bedrock in the area contains uranium. A year ago a fence was built around the biggest hole and its pool of strange water to keep the reindeer from drinking it. Other animals that can go through or over the metal netting of the fence still drink from the bond.
The company operating in the area is currently doing test drillings. Drilling below the groundwater levels and so possibly polluting the groundwaters as they now might come in contact with sulphur and uranium through these holes. In the 60's in another part of Kuusamo geologists have made similar drilling tests and created radioactive springs that still flow freely in the wilderness. Down the stream of River Kitkajoki there is a village of Juuma where my grandmother is from. People there use the groundwater as drinking water. Even though the test drilling site is a few kilometers away people are already worried and have started to test their drinking water for traces of uranium. The mining company has said that they are not seeking uranium but never the less the uranium will be coming to the surface and will be stored inside the mine as side stone. This means that there will be piles of side stone and sand containing possibly high levels of uranium that might eventually drain to the surrounding water systems: the River Kitkajoki, the groundwaters and lakes around the area. The Kitkajoki could be radioactive in the future.
The mining project is marketed as being part of the fight against climate change as it would produce cobalt - the company calls it “The Operation Battery Ore”. Cobalt is desperately needed in batteries: renewable energy sources need a lot of batteries to store energy. Electric cars have become humanity's solution to decrease CO2 emissions. So there is an increasing demand for cobalt. The company argues that it wants to start extracting cobalt and gold from Kuusamo because of our great stable society and if they are not allowed to do it in Finland the cobalt needs to be excavated by child laborers in Congo.
Kuusamo is part of the arctic region where global warming is 2-3 times faster than elsewhere. The area would definitely benefit from slowing down the warming, but now it seems that the fight is creating local events that threaten to damage the area permanently. The war against the warming climate is going to create new casualties: the rivers, waters, plants, animals, peoples….
I’m happy that Tesla has just launched the model 3s electric cars that do not require this controversial metal in their batteries. But there is still the gold and the uranium that for sure is also tempting. But it is not as easy to market as cobalt. Gold is for greed and luxury (and electronics and other uses too for sure) and uranium is for“zero emission” nuclear power plants and nuclear weapons.
Down the stream along the river Kitkajoki from the mining project site the river enters the Oulanka National Park. One of the most popular hiking routes, the Karhunkierros runs inside the park up until Ruka Ski Resort. Tens of thousands of tourists visit here every year. The River runs at the bottom of the gorge here, there are several famous waterfalls or rapids on this part of the river. Many sites are advertising imagery of Kuusamo. Thousands of social media pictures are posted from here by visitors. If they only knew that some day the place might be radiating.
