Drillers for Twin Metals, at a site near the Kiwishiwi River in Ely, Minn., pull a core sample from a drill pipe. (Brian Peterson, Star Tribune/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

The Star Tribune Editorial Board recently lauded the federal government's announcement that it would be reinitiating a mineral withdrawal study on nearly a quarter-million acres of land in northeast Minnesota that could lead to a 20-year ban on mining in this area ("A win for Boundary Waters Stewardship," Oct. 25).

The question I pose to the board, to our nation's leaders and to mining opponents is this: Do you value smartphones, medical technology, clean energy solutions, broadband, electricity, roads, buildings and infrastructure? If you're like most common-sense Americans and answered unequivocally yes, then do you realize that the hardworking people of the mining industry produce the raw materials critical to all these things?

An assault on the mining industry is like attacking America's farmers for producing the food that sustains us. Simply put: It's wrong and hypocritical. And, unfortunately, Twin Metals Minnesota is not the first mining project to be targeted by the current administration. Nor are we the only ones that would be negatively impacted by a mining ban in northeast Minnesota, which sits on top of the world's largest known undeveloped copper-nickel deposit.

The communities of this region, who have experienced economic decline for decades, are first and foremost at risk due to the thousands of jobs that would be lost. But if the federal government is going to take a vast amount of our domestic nickel, cobalt, copper and platinum group metals off the table for development, our nation's ability to combat the climate crisis and to shore up our domestic supply chains is also at risk. This is an alarming contradiction to the administration's own priorities.

In the 40 years I have spent working in the mining industry, there has never been a more thrilling time to be part of this business. Mining companies and international organizations that set the standards for industry best practices have made incredible strides in the past several decades in what it means to operate a mine responsibly: by reducing an operation's impacts; engaging meaningfully with local communities; providing new, high-tech job opportunities and safer working conditions; and thinking more globally about our industry's role in sustainably supplying the world with the raw materials it needs.

And if you ask anyone in the mining industry familiar with the Twin Metals Minnesota project, they will tell you that we are putting forward one of the most innovative mining projects in the world that is safe for the environment. That's because our underground mining project has a small surface footprint, a tailings management system lauded as the most environmentally friendly way to store leftover mining materials, an electric vehicle fleet which greatly reduces emissions, and there is no open pit or potential for acid rock drainage with our mine.

This is also a very challenging time to work in this business. In the U.S., it now takes an average of 16 years to permit a new mining project, and this comes at a time when we are simultaneously facing a global climate crisis and projected mineral shortages. Additionally, mining opposition groups for years have used fear-based campaigns and lies to politicize an otherwise science- and fact-based regulatory review process for new mining projects.

Twin Metals Minnesota is at the front end of that regulatory review process. We have worked for more than a decade to put forward the best project using the best science to demonstrate we can advance a safe mining project. And we know that this is not an either-or proposition. We can have high-paying, family-sustaining jobs and protect the environment. We welcome the opportunity to prove it. We are confident we can.

And I believe the government and the opposition know we can prove it, which is why they are playing this political shell game and manipulating the process attempting to take our project off the table. To which my response is: Twin Metals Minnesota is in this for the long haul. We are not giving up on the communities of northeast Minnesota. We are not going away, and the science and the facts will demonstrate that our project can be done safely.

Kelly Osborne is chief executive, Twin Metals Minnesota.