Reform of 1872 law would make Barrick, Newmont pay federal mineral royalties

The federal law designed to promote gold mining in the West was enacted by President Ulysses S. Grant in 1872, and it has remained mostly unchanged ever since.

The General Mining Act of 1872 allows miners to obtain the rights to mine billions of dollars worth of gold, silver, copper and other minerals found in “hard rock” from federal lands without paying federal royalties.

Now there’s a bill for that.

Chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee, Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), and Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.), announced the introduction of their companion House and Senate mining reform bills that would establish a 12.5 percent royalty on production from new hard rock mining operations – the same amount as the federal government collects from oil & gas and coal production on federal lands – and an 8 percent royalty on existing operations, except for miners with less than $50,000 in mining income.

The federal government collects more than $6 billion in oil, gas and coal revenues, and disburses almost half of that money to the states where the mineral is produced. The Grijalva-Udall mining bill, however, would only return 25 percent of revenues to state, putting the rest into a reclamation fund.

Read more: https://www.nevadacurrent.com/2019/05/10/reform-of-1872-law-would-make-barrick-newmont-pay-federal-mineral-royalties/