Frac Sand Mine (this is at the St Croix 360 website--a good place to track local river happenings)
http://www.stcroix360.com/
The Milwaukee Sentinel reports "The spill into the St. Croix began with a citizen complaint on April 26, 2012.
According to the settlement, the fine-grained sediments began to flow from the property some time between April 19 and 22. Neither company reported the mishap when it occurred, according to documents.
Aerial photos revealed a trail of polluted sediment from the mine to the St. Croix, which is a federally designated national wild and scenic river. The mine is next to Governor Knowles State Park and land owned by the National Park Service."
Take a look at Frac Sand Mining on earlier posts on my blog
Visit to the mine
Mine Land Purchase
Value of frac sand mine
Governor Pawlenty of MN and Frac Sand Mining
Frac sand is a resource needed for the oil production done by fracking (pumping hot water, frac sand, and other chemicals into oil wells to fracture the deep underground oil bearing rock and make it pump-able). Oil producing states make huge money from a tax on the per-barrel oil extraction that makes those states free from income taxes and flush with money--in particular North Dakota right now.
Since frac sand mining is here to stay, Wisconsin and Minnesota need to have a per-ton extraction tax so the citizens of the states actually benefit from the mining process just as the energy producing states do.
