Welcome to The Landscape, your show about America's Parks and Public Lands. I'm Erin Weiss with the Center For Western Priorities in Denver. And I'm Kate Gratzinger in Salt Lake City. We've got a great episode for you today about a story that's unfolding in Nevada's Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge is home to the famous or infamous Devil's Hole Pupfish, which is undergoing a big rebrand right now,
thanks to nearby lithium mining interest. I don't wanna give too much of that away, but you're gonna wanna stay tuned for this one. But first, the news. Well, I'm gonna use this opportunity to plug us and a report that Kate and I released last week. It is called the National Monuments Disinformation Brigade. This is a who's who guide to the crowd that is working to derail land protection
in the West. And they're doing this using fear mongering and conspiracy theories, not good faith concerns for public lands. The report, we're looking at dozens, hundreds of pages, maybe, of raw research
that got distilled down into this. We looked through social media posts, press interviews, blog posts, and transcripts from an absolutely bonkers anti 30 by 30 conference to show that these folks really have a very tenuous grasp on reality, and that is affecting the debate over national monuments. So you may be wondering who is in this group. Well, it's folks like Ben Bur, a very politically well connected guy who heads up the Blue Ribbon Coalition, is also Senator Mike Lee's nephew by marriage.
Folks like Marb Grit Byfield of American Stewards of Liberty, who we've talked about on this podcast before. Some new faces, Sean Pond and Amy Tooker of Halt the Dolores Monument in Colorado. And, of course, our old friend William Perry Pendley, who illegally served as President Trump's head of the Interior Department and who more recently wrote the Heritage Foundation's Project 2025 chapter on the Interior Department. Those are just a few of the names in this report. We will drop a link
to that in the show notes. Please do go read it, send it to your friends, print out copies, and leave it for, any county commissioners or state legislators or members of congress who might be interested in this debate over national monuments. Our guest today is Wyatt Mieskow. He covers drought, biodiversity, and the renewable energy transition throughout the western US for Inside Climate News. Today, we're talking to him about a recent story he wrote about a wildlife reserve in Southwest Nevada.
Wyatt, thanks so much for being here. Thanks for having me. So your story takes place in the Ash Meadows Wildlife Refuge, which you say is sometimes called the Galapagos of the Mojave. Where exactly is it, and what makes it so special? So Ash Meadows is about an hour and a half east of Las Vegas near the California border. It's located in the Armagosa Basin, and it's right next to Death Valley National Park. Basically, the Funeral Mountain Ranges kind of
separate the 2. And given that it's, you know, right next to Death Valley, you can imagine it's a very hot and dry place. But 1000 of years ago, it had a lot of water there. And that water back then has kind of left behind this really intricate and delicate groundwater system. And over fifties, Seapin Springs kind of found in the Ash Meadows area. And that's led Ash Meadows to have or be the home of the greatest
let me restart that sentence. That's led Ash Meadows to become the home of the greatest concentration of endemic life in the United States. So you have at least 26 endemic species found in Ash Meadows, 12 of which are listed as threatened or endangered. And so that's kind of where it's gotten this title as the Galapagos because it's just this haven of biodiversity in one of the harshest places you can imagine. Right? I mean, it's right
next to Death Valley. I was there in end of June, and it was it was hot. And it's an incredibly unique place, and I say that as someone I grew up in the Mojave Desert on the California side. And, you know, driving into, Ash Meadows in the Amargosa Basin, it looks a lot like where I grew up. It's, you know, dirt and creosote bushes everywhere. But then you, you know, spend a little time in ash meadows and you stumble across, you know, these kind of oases
in the sea of creosote. And dirt is, you know, these these cottonwoods, lush cottonwoods, and these bodies of water that are, you know, like crystal blue that are fed from these this ancient groundwater system that provides a home for, you know, endangered fish that are found nowhere else in the world. And you see these little fish just swimming around in the middle of the summer when it's a 110 outside, and there should be, like, no water in places like this.
Really, in most of the Mojave, it's quite dry. And it's it's just a fascinating little place, and it's earned kind of a a cool reputation as the Galapagos of Mojave. And when you say endemic, that means they're they're found there and nowhere else. Right? Correct. They're endemic. They're you won't find them anywhere else in the Mohave or in another desert, and they're just in Asmetos.
Wow. So one of these endemic species is the Devil's Hole pupfish, which sounds both kind of badass and adorable at the same time. What makes this fish, the the pupfish, so unique? Yeah. So the Devil's Hole pupfish is, you know, a pupfish that's found in Ash Meadows. It's actually technically part of Death Valley National Park, but it's in Ash Meadows. It's kind of a weird thing because the fish got its protections before death or Ash Meadows was a wildlife refuge.
But it's kind of famed for being the most endangered fish that we know of in the world. This spring, they counted the most of them in quite some time, just under 200 in the wild. And they live in this water filled cavern and kind of this hillside in Ash Meadows. It just it looks like a regular kind of rocky hillside you find in the Mojave, but there's this cavern and it's filled with water. They don't even know how deep it goes. And it's it's hot water. It's over 90
degrees. And they live kind of towards the surface on the shelf, and they, you know, eat kind of the stuff that grows there on that shelf. And for 1000 of years, they've just lived there and somehow been able to survive. And it's, again, I mean, it's it's the rarest most endangered fish in the world, and it's pretty famous for that.
And it's their discovery led to the creation of Ash Meadows and ultimately kind of a lot of the protections that came for the area later on and also, of course, you know, other species in the area being listed as
endangered or threatened. And it's kind of the formation of, you know, Ash Meadows as a refuge, but then also for this story that I did, the Devil's Hole Pup Fish has kind of become kind of the rallying symbol behind this fight against this lithium mine because the concern is this lithium mine may consume water or impact this groundwater aquifer that feeds, you know, these seeps and streams for the other fish, but also this cavern that make makes Devil's Hole.
And if those water levels go down, you have less of that critical habitat. Devil's hole pupfish, you know, might see declines in its population. And, the community and environmentalists out there are concerned about that, obviously. So the the devil's hole pupfish, is sort of go undergoing a rebranding right now, and that's kind of, like, what, the the basis of your story. Can you tell us how this fish has been viewed locally in the past and and how that's changing and why?
Yeah. So as I read in the story and what I heard from, you know, environmentalists and community members while visiting, Armagosa, which is the town near Ash Meadows that's here maybe 10 minutes away, was that, you know, when the devil's hole pupfish got its protections under the Endangered Species Act, it was a pretty nasty fight between kind of, environmentalists and the Fish and Wildlife Service and the community because there was, you know, farmers were
moving in. There's a lot of development happening, and they were pumping groundwater. And that was leading to reduced water levels, in Devil's Hole. And that led to, you know, obviously, concerns that this fish could become extinct. And it led to a supreme court case, so very important one that ruled that to protect the species under the Endangered Species Act, the groundwater pumping and development could be limited.
And not long after that decision, you know, developers, they had been planning a city of almost 50,000 people in the area. That fell because they couldn't find a way to make it work while also protecting the fish. And so for many locals in the area, the devil's hole pupfish was viewed as this little fish that no one really sees or knows about that killed any chances of there
being any development in the area. And so it was kind of viewed as a hated pest at the the the visitor center at, you know, Ash Meadows. They have stickers that show, you know, back in the seventies when this all was going playing out, you know, people having stickers saying, no. Kill the pupfish and stuff like that. And, some of that sentiment has remained for years, obviously.
You know, Ash Meadows is located in Nye County, which is a pretty if you know Nevada politics and Nevada issues, you know it's a pretty conservative county in Nevada, where, you know, the environmentalists and the county doesn't get along too much. But what's united them and what's kind of caused this rebranding is that there's a drought. Wells are running dry in the Amargosa Basin.
This is an over over, over pumped aquifer at this point through the and there's, you know, wells are running dry at local, you know, people's houses. And with this mine coming in, you know, this might seem as like a really great economic opportunity, but residents, who usually would not be on the same side as the environmentalists who have been protecting this pupfish for decades, realize now that, hey, this pupfish
is how we can stop this mine. Because of its endangered, you know, species act protections, you can kind of use that as a rallying cry and ability to kind of hopefully stop this mining development. And that's what they're pushing for, and that's what's united them. And so they now realize that the Devil's Hole Pupfish and Ash Meadows as a refuge might be the way to kind of save them from what they fear will be a project that will take more water away from them.
Alright. So walk us through this process, of lithium mining and what's being proposed for the area, and why is that put that mine potentially such a threat to the water? Yeah. So Rover Critical Minerals is a a junior mining company, which means they they kind of just do exploratory. They they find places that might be suitable for a mine. And, this kind of site that they proposed in the Armagosa Basin, Armagosa Valley, it kind of came because, you know, there's
access to infrastructure. There's a community there with workers and housing, and they found lithium in the area. And, what they've kind of shared so far, at the beginning, it sounded like open pit mines, and maybe that's still the plan. There was a town hall that I visited in June, where their idea was, you know, they wanted to just potentially mine the surface of the
ground. You only dig maybe 20, 30 feet in the ground, really do a lot of surface level digging because, in the area because 10000 years ago, there were a lot of lakes and rivers in the area that are now dried up. There's a lot of playa, playas in the area, and those are filled with lithium. And their goal is to extract that lithium
if it's economically feasible. But, again, they're in the, I mean, pretty much beginning stages of this, which kinda makes it interesting that this fight has already, gotten so heated is because, you know, all they've really done so far is file their claims. You know, they've stuck their sticks in the ground and said, we're interested in mining this potentially. And they got approval last summer from the Bureau of Land Management to begin doing the drilling. And what they're
gonna do is it's exploratory drilling. They're testing the lithium quality, see if it's maybe feasible economically, to mine here. And if the lithium's of good quality, there's enough of it to do it, yada yada, all that kind of stuff. And but that got stopped because the Center For Biological Diversity and the Armagosa Conservancy sued, and the BLM realized or they realized that they hadn't done an environmental impact statement. And maybe they should because there's a wildlife refuge next door.
I mean, literally, it's a the the mining claims are a couple 100 feet away from, Ash Meadows boundaries. And so there's obviously big concerns that if you drill into the ground, and at the time, you know, we were talking potentially down to the water table, down into the aquifer, You puncture that aquifer, you have a blowout essentially. And then water levels for these soups and streams that kind of make up this wildlife in Ash Meadows certainly doesn't have the same
amount of water it did before. And so maybe you see some of these endangered species like the devil's hole pufffish or some of the other endangered fish found in the area not have the habitats they need to be able to continue surviving. And that's the big concern of this project. And it's, you know, I mean, it's it's it's years away from even being a mine if it even gets to that stage. But because this is such a delicate ecosystem, there there this is an ancient groundwater system.
You're already seeing problems. There's already concerns down the road in the coming decades with climate change of, you know, can some of these species even continue to survive or at least at the same levels they have been? It's a very uniquely adapted place. It doesn't take a lot to mess that up. This drilling, even though it's maybe, you know, obviously not as impactful as a open pit mine. Right? It can still have some impacts on that groundwater aquifer, and that's the real concern here. So
how are federal agencies responding to this? You mentioned the BLM. Fish and Wildlife, I'm assuming, manages the refuge. Why can't they just stop this project considering it poses such a dire threat, or can they? Well, that's a great and complicated question. You know, the so, technically, this the the the these mining claims that the company has filed, it's on open public land managed by the Bureau of Land Management.
It is adjacent right next to this wildlife refuge and also not very far from a national park. But the land itself that they have filed these claims on obviously is doesn't have those protections. So they're able to do this. And under, you know, this country's current mining laws, it's fairly easy to file those claims and begin the mining process as long as you're willing to do it.
And so, you know, the BLM, they didn't realize at the time, an environmentalist legend that BLM eventually admitted, that kind of the impacts this would have. Because on the surface, you know, it's outside the rep the boundaries of the the refuge. So you don't think about, hey. Maybe the land's it's not in the refuge, but the groundwater system that this refuge relies on, it's the same aquifer. And so that's kind of where it led to complications.
A coalition is formed, kind of pushing the interior department to do a mineral withdrawal for 20 years, in essentially, the area surrounding Ash Meadows, to protect from future, mining claims in the area. That doesn't stop with this one, but it would stop future mines if they wanted to come in, for it's for 20 years. After that, it gets more complicated. And that doesn't obviously stop this one, but it would be a sign of protection.
And then, also, you know, the BLM has expressed interest in, you know, working with this coalition that's formed to protect Ash Meadows in finding a solution. And so there we've begun the environmental, assessment for this project, you know, and that's not out yet. And we'll see what happens. But, obviously, if the prod the mud the the drilling was found to, you know, impact endangered species, you can imagine if you can't find a mitigation for that, then the project's likely done.
At least that's the hope for this coalition. Give us a sense of the the politics on the ground. Are there any local groups aside from this mining company that are saying, yes, please, we wanna see a a lithium mine at Ash Meadows? And that's what kind of drew me to this story is that there is really no one on the ground besides this mining company that's in support.
It's kind of a strange bedfellows situation. Like I mentioned earlier, this is Nye County, pretty conservative, county that's, you know, told the environmentalists that if this was a different fight in a different place, we'd probably be on the opposite side. But they recognize that Ash Meadows is a pretty unique place next to Death Valley. These communities nearby are, you know, tourism is a pretty big draw, or would they would like it to be
a big draw? Because you do have these natural resources nearby, and you have people who wanna come see them. So, it's kind of a surprising turn of events of that. You have, environmentalists and tribes who are usually allies on these types of things against mines. They've teamed up, obviously. But then you also have the local community at the local town of Armagosa completely opposed, to this project. You have the county completely opposed to this project.
Nevada's Democratic congressional delegation, which is most of their congressional delegation, has come out against this and, you know, urged the Department of Interior to withdraw this land from, you know, from from being extractable from mineral minerals. And so there's really not much local support. When I went out to the town hall, there was well over a 100 people there, and, many people spoke. Only 2 residents said they were in support
out of dozens that spoke. And one of them, you know, his reasoning was it's an older community, obviously, living in the desert, and most of them will be dead in 10 years anyways. So who cares what happens to the water? And, you know, I think it was food, and he was kinda laughed off, after saying that. And so, a little bit of sport, obviously. There's, you know, obviously, potential economic development here and economic opportunity, which could be exciting for this town.
But they don't view it as worth it because if they don't have water, you don't have anything as they told me. Water is life as they say. So I was surprised in your story to read that even senator Catherine Cortez Masto, who is a big friend of the mining industry, is, supporting and asking for the mineral withdrawal for the area.
Meanwhile, she's pushing legislation that would allow companies much more leeway in, dumping mine waste, which would, you know, make a lot of different types of mining a lot more, a lot easier to do in the west. I'm curious why you think she's on board with this mineral withdrawal, and whether you think that this situation is impacting her her view of mining, specifically lithium and water intensive mining in Nevada.
Yeah. Well, I can't speak too much to the senator's positions because I'm not her. But I I think what, you know, you point out that she's been in support of many other mining projects in the state of Nevada and across the west, and that she's behind the mining clarity act, which would, you know, make it essentially easier to do some mining activities on public lands.
I think what makes this different, and she said this in a congressional hearing earlier this summer when, talking to the BLM's director, Tracy Stone Manning, about Ash Meadows and and trying to protect it, You know, she said she said that every community leader that she had spoken to that lives in that area, they're unanimous in their opposition. And I think that's what separates this
from maybe other projects. You know, in my, reporting, I have reported on many public land projects, whether it's a mine or solar or, pump storage or what have you. And you'll always find people who are opposed, but also people who are in support. And but this is a case that's kind of been shocking to me is that there really is no local support, at least for now.
And I think that's the kind of big dividing line between for senator Cortez Masto and maybe some other of, you know, Nevada's, leaders is that the the local community does not want this. And and if they don't want this and you can't find a group that does want this, why would you come out in support of
it? I think also maybe, you know, some would, you know, criticize senator Cortez Masto's environmental record, for because of, like you mentioned, some of the things she's done in regards to mining, and maybe in public land projects and and or public land sell offs and land deals in Clark County. She know that many in the environmental community in Nevada criticized her for that. And this would be, you know, supporting this and getting this done. That seems like a fairly easy win potentially,
of getting, hey. You know? Sure. I did this, but I did get you Ash Meadows protected. And, you know, it's all politics at the end of the day. Yeah. The the math works out. So I wanna follow-up on what you were saying earlier about the sort of endangered species nature, and and how that could really be what stops this. Can you say more about that?
Like, what is the level of proof that the BLM or Fish and Wildlife has to reach in order to really, end this given that our mining laws are so permissive and so skewed towards, you know, allowing things to go forward, regardless of the impacts on the ground? Yeah. Great question. I think it's one of those things we kind of have to wait
and see. I think because of a mining statute of mining, the laws that exist on the books for mining, it makes it kind of complicated because the mining takes a precedent over a lot of stuff. But, you know, there's been
cases in Nevada. You know, earlier this year, the state Supreme Court in Nevada ruled, you know, that if the the state engineers, which oversees water rights in the state, if the science shows that groundwater pumping will impact other water right holders or endangered species and or maybe both, probably both in many cases, they cannot issue that that project, its water rights, and they can effectively kill it.
That that was earlier this year. And, you know, when I was talking to folks on the ground at the time when that state Supreme Court decision happened, you know, one of the situations they pointed to that they thought that decision could really impact is what's happening in
Ash Meadows. If you can prove that this ground, what the science shows that this exploratory drilling will impact the aquifer and that will reduce water levels at the Devil's Hole, for example, and impact the Devil's Hole pupfish, then the state engineer doesn't have to issue the water rights. For the fish and wildlife service itself, you know, I think usually the way things work is that there's clear impacts to an endangered species and there's not a way to mitigate them.
That usually is a pretty effective way at killing projects. I'm not sure how it works with mining. If if mining regulations kind of maybe supersede some of those. I'm not as sure on that, but the hope here is that because of the refuge's status, also, you know, Death Valley being nearby as well and everything that's there, because this is the same aquifer. It also feeds into parts of Death Valley.
If you can show that this drilling will impact those groundwater levels, then the the hope is the endangered species act can kill this. So it sounds like there's sort of 2 different routes where by which this could die. Either the water rights or, the state engineer or, you know, the fish and wildlife service in the BLM saying, this project can't happen because the the impacts are
too high and they can't be mitigated. Now if they can be mitigated, and that's where these things can get sometimes really tricky, you see this in, like, Ryloot Ridge, which is another lithium project that's much further along, in Nevada where, you know, the the the environmental impact statement's very clear that it will destroy critical habitat for an endangered wildflower. That decision is supposed to come in the next fairly soon, I believe.
We'll just have to wait and see what the BLM does, because the company feels confident that their mitigation levels or mitigation plans can account for destroying critical habitat. And, I mean, that'd be I think that'd be a real kind of litmus test over in, you know, Nevada or lithium projects in Nevada and whether they can kind of mitigate those things and then if the BLM will, you know, buy that, you know, plant.
I wanna look at the big picture and, do something that I know reporters hate to do, which is get out your crystal ball and speculate wildly for us. The fact that this is playing out in Nevada, which traditionally has been the state where the elected officials have been the most determined to not overhaul the the mining act of 1872.
Is the fact that this is happening here, the fact that this company can come in and make this proposal and basically have the run of the place, thanks to 18/72, do you think that changes the national calculus on fixing the mining law. Is there any talk here of okay. Maybe this is a step too far and with the the push with the need for lithium being so high, we need to address this here or we're gonna be having this fight over and over again for the next 50 years.
Yeah. That's a great question. And, obviously, you know, there's been signs from the Biden administration that, hey, Some aspects of our mining laws should maybe be updated. Though, the question, of course, is can you get Congress behind it? And I think the answer is probably not. We're closer to passing things that make it easier to mine, not passing things that make it harder to mine.
So what I do think it shows kind of nationally, and I think this is a growing trend you've seen for years now, is we recognize that some of our environmental laws are not ready for, well, environmental issues, but also climate change issues. And so you see workarounds by project opponents to get a project stopped in ways that are kind of creative.
And I think this is a great case of recognize it looks as though residents are opposed, wells are going dry, but there's no real laws on the book saying, oh, well, wells are already going dry. We're concerned this lithium mine will cause more wells to go dry. That's all it takes to stop this mine. Right? That's not enough. The good of human human community is not quite enough to stop it. So what do you do? You look at the endangered species act, and you find, you know, oh, hey.
We have a refuge right next door that has a bunch of endangered species and is also just a wildlife refuge that's, you know, supposed to be protected from, environmental impacts for these, you know, species and for this landscape. And so you go down that route, and I think it's just another example of that. And I think it's kind of one of those unfortunate cases where if you don't have something like that, then there's not much you can do to
stop it. And I haven't heard much conversation about from, you know, reporting on this story about overhauling mining laws in general in this country or updating the 18/72 Mining Law Offering, you know, getting a new one, maybe a 2025 Mining Act. Right? But what I have heard is it shows that we need to be more strategic in our rush to, you know,
address climate change. You know, the opponents of the project are you, for this and many other, you know, environmentally potentially destructive projects is that we're building projects in places where maybe they're not very well suited because we're in such a rush to try and find these critical minerals, that we're willing to, you know, overlook some of those things maybe at some times.
And what they're arguing is, hey. Maybe we should look at you know, in Nevada, we should look at the land available, and we should decide what is what are the places that we can mine and what are the places that are completely off the table? Similar to what you're seeing, you know, and I think maybe example of this that you're starting to see is, like, the Bureau of Land Management is updating its Western Solar Plan to identify ahead of time where is solar most suitable
and what's off the table. Where are the places we're not gonna put utility scale solar farms on? And I think there's a push from those against this project who have, you know, had some success now in opposing it and getting this coalition on board of doing something similar in regards to mining. Obviously, I think that's, you know, a long ways away. There's no legislation that I'm aware of being crafted to address that, but that has been something in Nevada that's gotten some, discussion.
Nothing majorly yet, but time can change. And maybe this project is what kind of pushes that to have that conversation to make those plans. Well, I feel like you just sort of touched on my last question, which is, the real bird's eye view here, which is the climate change is, you know, causing some of these waters or exacerbating some of these water shortages. Lithium, of course, is the demand for lithium is going up because it can help us fight climate change, by being part of renewable energy.
So how are people talking about that trade off? I know you mentioned planning, and that's always great. We we're big advocates for land use planning here. But what is that conversation like in Nevada right now? How are people viewing, you know, being sort of ground 0 for this terrible climate trade off that's happening because of climate change? Yeah. I mean, Nevada is kind of ground 0 for that because, I think it's actually especially unique in Nevada because it's not a, you know, you're not
fracking in Nevada for oil. So there's not this traditional, I mean, you have traditionally a lot of mining, but not necessarily other forms of energy development. And now you're starting to see this if you have solar coming in massively. Also, near Ash Meadows in the Armagost Basin, there's a ton of solar that's coming. It's also gonna be the side of the Greenlink transmission line if that gets through, which seems probably likely.
And so they're really seeing a ton of the mining, the solar, the pump storage, the transmission coming to Nevada. And I think what you just talked about kind of, you know, we need these critical minerals. We need these solar panels because we need to address climate change. We need to get out fossil fuels. We we have the science telling us what's gonna happen if you don't do that quickly
enough. And Nevada's seeing that. It's that has led to a lot of I mean, that's pretty much the root of every environmental fight in Nevada is that this is the state where a lot of especially in rural Nevada where there's a lot of you know, it's 80% public land, and so these towns don't have a lot of say in what happens next door. And they're kind of getting into these fights because they've kind of become the state that's gonna sacrifice to, you know,
address climate change. And that's behind all the fights in Nevada, from Ash Meadows to Rilovich to Thacker Pass, to, you know, solar and pump storage projects that don't get as much media attention sometimes. I mean, that's behind all of it. And I think some communities feel very much a little bit left behind and maybe voiceless.
And I was talking to the town manager of Armagosa about this project, and, you know, her feeling was that, you know, she's worked with the federal government and the state to do solar in Armagosa. And, you know, she's not thrilled about that, and the community is not thrilled about being surrounded by solar. But they they recognize that there's a need for it and that since it is federal land, they don't have a ton of say.
So they've worked them to find the right places and to, you know, get some support behind it and not completely opposed. Right? Her argument is, okay. We've done that. We have the transmission line gonna come through here one day. There's gonna be a lot of solar here. Just keep the mine away. Just don't don't mind near us, because that's one where the environmental impacts are too much. The trade off isn't worth it. They're too worried about the
water. You know? I mean, something she told me, and many residents, pretty much everyone I spoke to out there is that this community could be dead in 10 years already. But they know if a mine comes in and takes up their water and causes more wells to run dry, and then you also have, you know, obviously, quality of that water concerns as well, then the town's definitely dead. And they want to at least try and fight and save it.
So it's a really interesting story happening in Nevada, and I think this Ash Meadows situation really kind of showcases it because these communities are seeing the brunt of these problems, and they're trying to make the most of it. And it can be hard to fight some of these things when there's, you know, so much pressure and so much money behind it. We will leave it there. Wyatt Myskow is a reporter with Inside Climate News. Thank you so much for your time and your insight today.
Thanks for having me. Appreciate it. In good news this week, we're excited to share that the Biden administration is moving forward with a proposal to protect part of California's Central Coast. The Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary is the 1st tribally proposed sanctuary in the US.
NOAA released a final EIS, that's an environmental impact statement, for the proposal last week, which would include over 4,000 square miles of coastal waters along 116 miles of the coast stretching roughly from San Luis Obispo to Santa Barbara. It will be the 3rd largest sanctuary in the National Marine Sanctuary System if and when it's designated. We made a video about that proposal for our 30 30 postcard series, and we'll drop a link to that in the show notes.
That's all for today, folks. We, of course, always love to hear from you, so drop us an email with questions, comments, complaints, compliments, if you wanna know more about that anti monuments disinformation brigade, of course, happy to talk about that as well. And if if you like the news segments of this podcast, go subscribe to our daily newsletter, Look West. We will drop that link in the show notes.
Thanks again to Wyatt for his great reporting on Ash Meadows, and thank you for listening to the landscape.