The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.
TIMMINS – Rebirth is a concept that few truly fathom, but the area once known as the old ‘Hollinger Slimes’ has been re-born. It is now set to be slowly opened to the public by linking it with the trail system around Hersey Lake.
When national legislation changed in 1991, it became the responsibility of mining operations to develop and follow through with closure plans to ensure the land utilized in operations was returned to its natural state. For decades-long operations like the McIntyre, Hollinger and Dome, this requirement was more than a tall order.
Despite this steep learning curve, Goldcorp has now received its second Tom Peters Memorial Award, a tip of the legislative hat towards the company’s efforts in the Conarium, Hollinger Tailings and the McIntyre concentrate dump.
“This is the second time in a row that we have won the national Tom Peters Memorial Award,” said environmental manager Laszlo Gotz. “This site, the Hollinger Tailings Management area, where we started reclaiming in 2009 and finishing in late 2012 and now a year later, this area is a green and lush as anywhere else in this area.”
When Gotz and his team first arrived on site, the landscape was alien, barren and poisoned. Tailings ponds shone an unnatural blue, the the rock coated in the arsenic and other heavy chemicals. It sat as it had for decades, a poisoned reminder of long outlawed industry practices.
“We stripped the land to the bedrock,” said Gotz. “We had workers come in with fire hoses to wash the bedrock down, we then transported the contaminated tailings to another site and buried them, we then seeded, mulched and watched this lush green belt grow again.”
The reclamation efforts took a fraction of the usual time, a process which Gotz said can take decades.
“We have a very strong team of reclamation specialists,” he said. “We also strengthened our team with a biologist two years ago to help understand the original ecosystem and create the conditions required to encourage rebirth and regrowth.”
Through the help of their reclamation biologist, the area has attracted a family of black bears, countless bees and more than a handful of geese.
For the rest of this article, click here: http://www.timminspress.com/2013/07/02/goldcorp-earns-environmental-award