Behind Alaska's Pebble Mine controversy is a hidden-influence whodunit

Six federally recognized Native Alaskan tribes and commercial fishing interests started what may well prove to be Big Green’s biggest ballyhoo ever with a May 2010 letter to the Environmental Protection Agency against the proposed Pebble Mine — a huge prospect of copper, gold, and molybdenum near the vast salmon runs of Bristol Bay.

Pebble Limited Partnership, the mining company, saw the letter as a call for EPA to use Section 404(c) of the Clean Water Act — the rarely used “preemptive veto” hammer — that could block mine development before its plans were submitted.