OMA member Vale steps up environmental community communications efforts

This article was provided by the Ontario Mining Association (OMA), an organization that was established in 1920 to represent the mining industry of the province.

Ontario Mining Association member Vale has recently launched a new sustainability website to share environmental information on its operations with citizens of Sudbury. The website www.valegreatersudburysustainability.com provides greater access to detailed and current information on Vale’s environmental initiatives in the Sudbury region.

The nickel producer has bumped up the level of disclosure and transparency with this website and provided the community with new channels to communicate questions, concerns and ideas to the company. This is an innovative approach to sharing information with employees, the local community and the broader public. Go ahead take a look at the site.

“Vale is committed to the long term sustainability of our operations in Sudbury, the local environment and our community,” said Angie Robson, Manager of Corporate Affairs for Vale’s Ontario Operations. “As part of that commitment, we have developed this resource for sharing information with the public about Vale’s environmental initiatives.”

The website has four main components dealing with air quality, water quality and treatment, reclamation activities and a community section. The air chapter contains information on the Clean AER (Atmospheric Emission Reduction) project and particulate control and monitoring programs. Detailed data is offered on concentrations of various substances are charted from a number of monitoring stations located around the Sudbury area.

The water section shares information on effluent treatment, discharge monitoring and drinking water treatment. There are also details on Vale’s water power management of hydro-electric generating stations in the area, which are operated by the company.

As part of Sudbury’s greater re-greening effort Vale grows about 250,000 seedlings from underground and surface greenhouses annually. These are replanted both on Vale property and throughout the Sudbury region. The reclamation section also shows work done on decommissioning mines, which are on a care and maintenance basis, such as Whistle and Crean Hill.

In the area of bio-diversity, Vale in Sudbury is engaged in several projects. It is raising rainbow trout from surface nurseries and walleye from underground nurseries to restock local lakes and rivers. It is also working with researchers from Laurentian University on reptile and amphibian restoration in the region.

The community component is where you can find information on upcoming events, news releases and links to community partners. The resources section has connections with a broad range of community, industry related and government websites.

Vale and its predecessor company Inco have been operating in the Sudbury region for more than 100 years. The company is a major international nickel and copper producer and the Sudbury ores also yield significant quantities of precious metals including gold, silver and platinum group metals. Vale’s Sudbury operations currently employ about 3,900 people at six underground mines, a mill, a smelter and a refinery.

Mining companies are responsible, solution-providing partners in society. They do more than find, extract and process minerals essential to our modern lifestyle. They take extra steps to communicate with their employees and the communities, which support their operations.