Background on Hudbay's Truck Traffic

Hudbay states in a 2023 technical report that access to the mine is via I-19, E. Sahuarita Rd and the Santa Rita Road. This means Copper World's heavy trucks would bisect Sahuarita's main commercial corridor hindering access to Sahuarita’s elementary, middle and high schools, recreational facilities, churches and government offices. 

The trucks will carry copper concentrate to be refined overseas, as well as diesel fuel and other hazardous chemicals and explosives. Hudbay also plans to modify its production process in the fifth year that could result in trucks hauling sulfuric acid. 

The heavy truck traffic will likely result in more frequent traffic accidents, injuries, and deaths, according to a 2011 Rosemont environmental report. The heavy trucks are in addition to daily commuter traffic for more than 1,200 workers during two years of construction and about 500 during operation. Although the exact number of trucks is unknown, a 2013 Environmental Impact Statement for the Rosemont Mine, now part of the Copper World project, estimated 110 one-way heavy truck trips per day. Even the relatively few trucks now travelling to the mine site along unpaved Santa Rita Road are causing a huge dust problem. 

Background Info on Hudbay's Illegal Right-of-way

In September, 2024, SSSR won a decision in federal court where the judge ruled that the Arizona State Land Department (ASLD) had violated the Open Meetings Law. This opened the door to a second lawsuit that Save the Scenic the Santa Ritas (SSSR) and Farmers Investment Company (FICO) filed on November 12, 2024, seeking to permanently overturn this the right-of-way (ROW) in its entirety.  This ROW is a vital part of Hudbay's proposed $1.3 billion Copper World mining complex. See our press release here.

SSSR believes that ASLD acted illegally when it gave Hudbay a right-of-way to pipe toxic mine tailings across the  Santa Rita Experimental Range, which is required by state law to be operated solely for ecological and rangeland research. 

On Friday, January 17, 2024, SSSR and FICO filed a Motion to Stay as a continuation of our to work, asking the court top stop any activity by Hudbay in the right-of-way until the outcome of lawsuit is determined. Our request to stay and our lawsuit asking that the ROW be revoked are both under consideration by the court.

The right-of-way is the lynchpin to Hudbay’s plans to construct a series of open pit copper mines on the west and east flanks of the Santa Rita Mountains about 35 miles south of Tucson. The right-of-way connects Copper World’s processing operations with nonadjacent land where the company intends to dump millions of tons of mine tailings.

Background on Hudbay's improper Class II air permit

In January 2025, Save the Scenic Santa Ritas, the Center for Biological Diversity, and Farmers Investment Co. have appealed the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality’s (ADEQ) decision to grant an air pollution permit to the Copper World mine. The state permit, issued Jan. 2, would allow Hudbay Minerals to blast a series of open pit copper mines that will destroy the northern half of the Santa Rita mountain range. The open pits will release thousands of tons of harmful air pollution including dangerous particulate matter, heavy metals and other hazardous air pollutants.

The appeal maintains that ADEQ  improperly calculated the amount of particulate matter the mine will release, and used this miscalculation to give the mine a Class II air permit instead of the required Class I that would better protect people’s health. 

The Class II permit fails to include advanced controls for particulate matter pollution, such as enclosing mining stockpiles and using state-of-the-art engineering to contain and control pollution from mining waste dumps, including a toxic slurry of tailings.

The permit will allow Hudbay to pile massive tailings dumps containing toxic chemicals like lead, cadmium and arsenic near homes and schools in the Corona de Tucson community. Our frequent strong winds will blow this dust into the community. This is already an ongoing problem in Green Valley and Sahuarita, where tailings dust from the Sierrita and Mission mines have repeatedly blanketed the area.