A CNMI gold mine but…

The CNMI has been given a second chance to develop the pozzolan industry but I can only wonder, hope, and pray it will really happen. I said in a letter long ago that “we could be sitting on a gold mine but no one will do the work” in regards to the first offer to mine pozzolan. The first offer was put down for cultural preservation issues that were indeed legitimate but not justifiable to deny the entire CNMI an opportunity to birth a new industry. The needs of the majority will always outweigh the wants of a few.

Given the fact that the pozzolan is considered the best quality, it stands to reason that we are sitting on a gold mine that only needs to be worked. But the question still remains: Will the proposed mining be allowed? I know there are still legitimate concerns for cultural preservation and the waste that will be deposited but these factors should not stop every legitimate attempt to start the mining process. I did my homework and pozzolan is not even in the dictionary or encyclopedia. Pozzolan is also found in only two places in the world and we are one of them. These facts tell me that we are sitting on a futuristic material for construction and that we should have never ran the first investor away. Look at us now!

As for the cultural concerns, the mining operation will actually contribute to efforts to repopulate the Northern Islands. Infrastructure, including a dock with a support system, will be needed for the mining operation that can also assist the locals who want to live or frequent the Northern Islands. The mining operation, from what I can tell, is only going to take up a small area of the island and there will be virtually no damage to the environment with improvements for living on Pagan.

The only legitimate concern for adverse effects is the waste that will be deposited. There must be adequate safeguards in place to assure that the waste will not be hazardous in any way. There is also the possibility of using the waste for landfill where it might be needed and other options may even be available—one person’s waste is another person’s treasure! There is a real possibility that we can develop a “product” that can be produced in the CNMI using pozzolan but someone must do the work. It may be as simple as bagging the pozzolan and selling it but someone in the CNMI must do the scientific research on possible pozzolan uses. CNMI observers and laborers will also be needed to do the work to make sure the waste will not have an adverse effect on the island and ocean environment—we are talking jobs for locals.

The mining of pozzolan should really be a no-brainer, given the lessons we should have learned from the CNMI’s mistake to run the first pozzolan investor away. Are we really going to just let the pozzolan sit there and do nothing while we continue to starve to death? You can’t save everything for the future and if we don’t take care of the present there may not be a future! Most adults are well aware of how important second chances are and the need to not make the same mistake again. The CNMI has a second chance but that age old question that I have raised so many time still remains to be answered: Who will do the work to make it happen? This belief that investors are going to somehow come and save us is misguided, as investors are not looking to save us but to make a buck so we (the CNMI) had better get on top of our game and find out what we can do with pozzolan in addition to selling it to the present investor. We have tons and tons of it to sell so someone needs to get busy quick, fast and in a hurry! The CNMI should allow the mining but at the same time we need to do our homework on pozzolan because it could literally be a genuine gold mine!