In a trade involving thousands of acres of mineral rights, the state has fully protected more of the Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park.
The state of Michigan negotiated a deal that gives it the mineral rights to more than 8,000 acres of the park. That means that part of the park won’t be mined for nickel, copper, and other minerals.
In exchange, the previous owner, Keweenaw Land Association Ltd., will get mineral rights to more than 9,000 acres of land scattered across six counties in the western Upper Peninsula.
The mineral rights are an important part of preserving the wilderness, said John Pepin, deputy public information officer with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. “People presume, because it’s in a park, that it’s forever protected. And this gives them more peace of mind that what we have is being preserved for the future."
In some cases the state owns the surface land of a park or state forest, but not the mineral rights below ground.
No money was exchanged in the deal, which took three years to negotiate.
“This gives the park and the state greater control over its park lands,” Pepin said
There is still mineral extraction on some part of the 60,000 acre park which includes 35,000 acres of old growth forest.
The deal does not include lands associated with the Copperwood project being developed by Highland Copper in the southwest corner of the park, according to a DNR news release. That effort will mine the minerals under parkland, but extract the material just outside of the park boundary.
The DNR said is Michigan’s most remote park, Craig Lake State Park in Baraga County, several mineral parcels are not owned by the state.
The department noted one other aspect of the agreement with Keweenaw Land Association, is that the state acquired mineral rights to a 40 acre property in Dickinson County where a mine operated previously and where some insect-eating bats now hibernate for the winter.
