Smoky Canyon Mine: Proposed Expansion of Superfund Site Threatens Fish, Wildlife and Roadless Areas

The Smoky Canyon Mine, operated by the J.R. Simplot Company in Southeastern Idaho, is a Superfund site that releases toxic selenium into the environment. Earthjustice and other organizations oppose the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management's plan to expand the mine into two Roadless Areas, arguing that the existing contamination has not been cleaned up and that further discharges would cause irreversible toxic impacts to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, including reproductive failure in fish and aquatic birds.

• The Smoky Canyon Mine is an open-pit operation that releases selenium, a toxic element, into the environment during phosphate ore mining for fertilizer. Despite government agencies agreeing years ago that the contamination needed to be addressed, cleanup has not yet begun, and the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management are proposing to expand the Superfund site into two Roadless Areas.
• Selenium presents a severe environmental risk because it bioaccumulates in the food web, persists for hundreds of years, and causes toxic effects such as embryo deformities and death at low levels. In Southeastern Idaho, the average selenium concentration in source rock is fifteen times higher than that found in California's Kesterson National Wildlife Refuge.
• Scientific assessments indicate that the Smoky Canyon Mine expansion poses an imminent and persistent toxic threat. Dr. Steven Hamilton's hazard assessment gave area streams a "high" rating, meaning the threat is sufficient to cause complete reproductive failure in most aquatic birds and fish species. A US Forest Service senior scientist described the ecosystem as a "tinder box" where additional discharges could trigger a cascade of irreversible events.
• Field research in Southeast Idaho has documented record-high selenium levels, including an American Coot egg with 80 ppm of selenium and aquatic invertebrates with 788 ppm, the highest ever reported from sampling across the western U.S. Additionally, a significant salamander die-off was diagnosed as selenium toxicosis, with tissue concentrations reaching 120 ppm.

APA

Earthjustice (2006). Smoky Canyon Mine: Proposed Expansion of Superfund Site Threatens Fish, Wildlife and Roadless Areas. https://earthjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/smokycanyon-bg_info.pdf

Chicago

Earthjustice. Smoky Canyon Mine: Proposed Expansion of Superfund Site Threatens Fish, Wildlife and Roadless Areas. 2006. https://earthjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/smokycanyon-bg_info.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Earthjustice |title=Smoky Canyon Mine: Proposed Expansion of Superfund Site Threatens Fish, Wildlife and Roadless Areas |date=September 2006 |url=https://earthjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/smokycanyon-bg_info.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{earthjustice2006smoky, author = {{Earthjustice}}, title = {{Smoky Canyon Mine: Proposed Expansion of Superfund Site Threatens Fish, Wildlife and Roadless Areas}}, institution = {Earthjustice}, year = {2006}, month = sep, url = {https://earthjustice.org/wp-content/uploads/smokycanyon-bg_info.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }