Sacred headwaters
The Sacred Headwaters is a subalpine basin in northern British Columbia, Canada, that is the source of three wild salmon rivers: the Skeena River, Nass River and Stikine River. It is also referred to as the Klappan Valley, although the Klappan—a tributary of the Stikine River—is only one of the area's watersheds. Local Tahltan people call the area Klabona, which is loosely translated as "headwaters."
The area has a significant population of grizzly bears, stone sheep, caribou, wolves, and goats.Salmon swim over 400 kilometres from the Pacific Ocean to spawn in the upper reaches of the river.
The Sacred Headwaters is rich in mineral and energy resources, particularly coal and coalbed methane. Several industrial development projects are planned for the area, including Fortune Minerals' open-pit Klappan Coal Mine and Royal Dutch Shell's Klappan Coalbed Methane Project. Shell Canada's website reports to be conducting several environmental baseline studies being carried out within the Klappan tenure area. The British Columbia Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources estimates the Klappan coal deposit could contain as much as 8.1 trillion cubic feet (230 km3) of coalbed methane gas.
Fortune Coal Limited (FCL) entered on 13 July 2011 into an unincorporated joint venture with Posco Canada (POSCAN). The venture, an 80–20 split, is based on mineral rights held by FCL and finances provided by POSCAN. FCL is 100% controlled by Fortune Minerals Limited, an Ontario-based company that trades on the TSX Venture Exchange, as symbol "FT". POSCAN, which has so far contributed $30 million to the project, is a subsidiary of one of the world's largest steel producers, and has strong ties to the Government of South Korea. The existing financial resources of the FML were not sufficient to bring any of its properties into commercial production as of 2012. The Klappan project was estimated to need $789 million to begin production, and to generate substantially less than 1,000 jobs. FML calls this the "Arctos Anthracite Project", and has dedicated a web page with detailed maps to its story.
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