One of Australian billionaire Gina Rinehart’s companies is embroiled in a fight being led by an award-winning Canadian singer that sounds like it could have come straight from the lyrics of a country music song.

In fact, according to the singer, it did.

“The song I wrote 10 or 12 years ago was a work of fiction, basically,” Corb Lund said in a recent interview with an Alberta website.

“I realised since this coal thing has reared its head, the song – almost line for line – has come true.”

Originally recorded in 2010 and featuring emotive lyrics about the environmental damage wrought by mining, This is My Prairie was re-released five years ago by Lund after Alberta reversed a long-standing policy that had protected the Eastern Slopes of the Rocky Mountains from new coal mining projects.

This month, Lund and fellow volunteers from a citizen-led Water Not Coal campaign presented Alberta officials with a petition with more than 178,000 signatures urging legislation to permanently ban new coal mining and exploration on the slopes.

It specifically mentioned two projects: The Grassy Mountain mine proposed by Northback Holdings, a subsidiary of Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting, and Valory Resource’s Blackstone Mine project.

“Albertans showed up for their water, their land, and their future,” Lund said in a statement last week announcing that the petition had reached the minimum number of signatures required for submission.

“Reaching this threshold proves what we’ve known all along – people care deeply about protecting our headwaters, our Rocky Mountains, and our way of life.”

Northback Holdings wants to reopen the Grassy Mountain site, which was originally mined more than 60 years ago, to extract metallurgic coal, which is used for steel production.

Its proposal was rejected in 2021 because of environmental concerns – including the risk to water quality and wildlife – but the campaigners fear it could get the green light after the application was revised.

Lund has been leading ranchers, environmentalists, fishers and other Albertans in a campaign against mining on the Eastern Slopes for the past five years.

Described as one of Canada’s most famous country singers – he won a Juno Award, the equivalent of the Grammys, for his album Hair in My Eyes Like a Highland Steer – has said he became involved because the Rocky Mountains are close to his heart.

Lund grew up on a ranch in Alberta’s south-west that has been in his family for 120 years, and said he wants the land protected for future generations.

“People have accused me of doing this to further my career,” he told Sierra website.

“I don’t have a political side. I don’t have leanings. My belief system is kind of à la carte. I don’t align with left or right. I don’t care about political parties. It’s nothing to do with that for me.”

 

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While Northback Holdings has said the Grassy Mountain mine would create jobs for nearby communities, Lund and his fellow campaigners are concerned it would be at the headwaters of a river providing thousands of people with drinking water.

“All it has to do with is keeping irresponsible coal mining out of the headwaters of our rivers,“ Lund said in another interview.

“That’s a thing for agriculture, for tourism, for hunters and hunters and fishermen, and just for our drinking water.”

Earlier this year, Northback CEO Mike Young said a revised plan for the Grassy Mountain project submitted to the Alberta energy regulator addressed the issues raised when the original proposal was rejected.

“One of the biggest changes is the footprint’s been reduced by about 40 per cent – that’s pretty significant,” he told CBC News in Alberta. “You reduce the footprint, you reduce the overall impact.”

Young said that under the revised application, the project would have “multiple lines of defence” to stop selenium leaching into the local water supply.

He added that Northback’s project was being driven by strong demand for metallurgic coal. If approved, it could be operating by 2030.

Despite being owned by an Australian company, Northback has the same obligations as any other Canadian company, Young said: “Just because your company is owned by a foreign company doesn’t give you any legal ability to shirk your responsibilities.”

However, that has done little to allay the concerns of those opposed to mining on the Eastern Slopes, who say it threatens “lifelines for communities, agriculture, and ecosystems across southern Alberta”.

More than 3000 registered volunteers were involved in collecting signatures for Water Not Coal’s petition, with Lund promoting it at his live gigs in recent months and also taking part in a three-day horseback journey as part of the campaign.

After being submitted to Elections Alberta, the petition will now be presented to the government and could see the question of a mining ban taken to a public referendum.

Lund said the petition put particular focus on Grassy Mountain because it was “one of the imminently looming projects in an extremely sensitive area”.

“It is a ‘foot in the door’ as it will reportedly provide much of the loading infrastructure for future mining projects,” he said.

“Grassy is the thin edge of the wedge and if we don’t stop Grassy Mountain, more and more mines will follow. Grassy is the goal line stand.”

Rancher and Grassy Mountain opponent Laura Laing, who originally approached Lund to join the campaign, told Sierra she was grateful he came on board.

“If it weren’t for his voice and platform, I truly believe we would already have open-pit coal mining across the eastern slopes.”