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NEWS RELEASE: Could demolition of Sudbury’s superstack signify environmental progress?

November 21, 2014

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.

Imagine Paris without the Eiffel Tower, Seattle without its Space Needle and Kuala Lumpur minus the Petronas Towers on the skyline. Now, try to imagine Sudbury without the Superstack! Okay these may not be structures designed for similar functions but they do cast a shadow over their cities, the psyches of their residents and how the rest of the world views them.

Recently, it was widely reported that Kelly Strong, Vice President of Ontario and U.K. Operations for mining giant Vale, told the Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce that his company was assessing the possibility of no longer requiring the 1,250 foot tall Superstack. It was built by Vale predecessor company Inco for an estimated cost in 1970 of $25 million. Construction started on the tallest smoke stack in Canada in 1970 and it was first operational in 1972.

The purpose of this structure was to disperse sulphur dioxide emissions and other waste from the nickel and copper smelter process. It was considered to be the right thing to do environmentally at that time. So the possibility of its dismantling must be a good sign environmentally, right?

“Given the tremendous reduction in emissions and change in our processes, we are working to figure out if we should continue to use the current 1,250 foot stack, or build something much smaller,” said Mr. Strong at the Greater Sudbury Chamber of Commerce event.

Superstack Removal Symbolic of Mining Industry’s Green Efforts – by Steve May (Sudbury Star – Novmeber 15, 2014)

November 15, 2014

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

www.sudburysteve.ca

Last week in Sudbury, Kelly Strong, Vice President of Vale’s Ontario and U.K. Operations, announced that Vale was considering taking down the iconic Superstack – a symbol of both Sudbury’s mining prosperity and of environmental degradation.

Mining has a reputation of being one of the world’s least environmentally-friendly enterprises. Along with scars left imprinted on natural landscapes, toxic chemicals released from processing and refining poison our soils and water. Massive amounts of energy, often from fossil fuel sources, are used to power industrial mining processes.

Yet, the world has a voracious appetite for minerals and metals. According to the Ontario Mining Association, mining contributes approximately $10 billion annually to Ontario’s economy, and employs around 23,000 workers directly and in support activities. Although we could be doing a much better job at recycling existing mined materials, it is expected that demand for new resources will remain high.

The story of the mining industry’s impacts on the natural environment isn’t all that different from that of other industries, except perhaps for the scale. Throughout the 20th Century, the mining industry was prodded to clean up its processes coincident with the public’s demand for healthier communities. In the 1960’s, the publication of Rachel Carson’s “Silent Spring” kicked off an environmental awakening culminating in the early 1970’s with new federal and provincial laws to protect the environment. With the public demanding real action from government and industry, INCO, Vale’s predecessor, was at work planning to reduce dangerous emissions.

Scientists look to mine metals from plants – by Steve Dorsey (Fox News – October 15, 2014)

October 16, 2014

http://www.foxnews.com/?intcmp=logo

Inside a lab at the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia, soil samples sit under a row of a glowing light bulbs hanging from a track only a short distance above them. In another room, a centrifuge hums as beakers of Nyquil-colored liquids sit on a nearby shelf. Standard white lab coats hang on hooks outside.

This generic-looking lab feels worlds away from the gritty, dusty mines of Australia—but this is where scientists hope to chart a new path for the industry here, and across the world.

If work being done at the Centre for Mined Land Rehabilitation catches on, it could mean new futures for global communities affected by resource-hungry strip-mining, and new ways for the mining industry to do business.

Australian scientists hope to accomplish this with phytomining—harvesting valuable metals from plants. Essentially, it’s growing plants containing nickel, zinc and cobalt—the bread and butter of the world’s mines, and harvesting the metals above ground, not below.

“We have identified a whole lot of new species which could be used for phytomining which weren’t previously known to science,” said Dr. Peter Erskine, one of the researchers working to make the process suitable for conventional mining companies.

Bees help restore Sudbury mining site – by Lisa Wright (Toronto Star – October 14, 2014)

October 14, 2014

The Toronto Star has the largest circulation in Canada. The paper has an enormous impact on federal and Ontario politics as well as shaping public opinion.

“Unsightly” mess left behind by a century of mining.

Retired foreman Wayne Tonelli worked in Sudbury’s nickel mines since he was a teenager, but his new gig is pretty sweet.
That’s because his old boss Vale (formerly Inco) is mining for more than metals these days. The company is in the ‘liquid gold’ business, enlisting thousands of honey bees to help restore a Sudbury landscape blighted by more than a century of nickel and copper mining and smelting.

“I like being outside after 40 years underground,” says Tonelli, now a bee-keeper for the international resources giant as part of a company program to re-green the area that decades back looked like a moonscape.

He carefully tends to seven hives containing 350,000 bees that are used to pollinate the blooming wildflowers the company has planted across 120 acres of unsightly black slag piles formed by waste from the Copper Cliff smelter complex, upon which the massive Superstack chimney sits.

“Bio-diversity is the buzz word in the resource industry these days,” explains Glen Watson, superintendent, reclamation and decommissioning for Vale’s Ontario operations.

Sudbury bees enhancing biodiversity on [Vale] slag piles – by Carol Mulligan (Sudbury Star – October 3, 2014)

October 3, 2014

The Sudbury Star is the City of Greater Sudbury’s daily newspaper.

Vale Ltd. has spent $10 million since 2006, revegetating mountains of ugly black slag, the waste from its Copper Cliff smelting operations, turning them into verdant hills along Big Nickel Road. It’s now up to one of nature’s smallest creatures to keeps those rolling hills green and to help enhance biodiversity.

Vale’s environmental team has started a program using honey bees to pollinate wildflowers planted as part of the company’s slag revegetation efforts. About 350,000 of the insects are living in seven hives contained inside a repurposed surplus trailer to protect them from the winter elements and from predators such as bears.

During three seasons, the honey bees leave the hives to forage on nectar and pollen, helping to keep the flowers planted on the hillsides thriving.

Glen Watson, Vale’s superintendent of decommissioning and reclamation, said the idea to use bees to continue the work started by people came to his team when it saw hills of slag blooming with wildflowers planted from seed.

It didn’t happen overnight. Revegetating the slag piles first involved breaking up hardened material that was molten when poured.

Vale, nickel giant, gets into the bee business in Sudbury, Ont. – by Markus Schwabe (CBC News Sudbury – September 26, 2014)

September 27, 2014

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/sudbury

Bees help enhance the seeding of flowering plants, ‘which helps with the biodiversity of our city’

Mining company Vale is hoping honey bees will encourage its re-vegetation project in Sudbury. For decades, nickel producer Vale (formerly INCO) dumped tons of molten slag around its refinery in Copper Cliff. The by-product of the nickel-smelting process accumulated until black mountains were formed.

In 2006, Vale embarked on a $10 million re-vegetation project to grade the landscape, cap the slag with soil, then scatter the ground with clover, grass and wildflower seeds. Trees were also planted.

This year Vale contacted the services of a retired Vale employee, Wayne Tonelli, to raise honeybees on the property. “With all the wildflowers, it was thought to promote pollination and help the re-vegetation process,” the Vale superintendent of decommissioning and reclamation said.

Seven hives are now buzzing with more than 350,000 bees. The hives are situated in an old utility trailer owned by Vale, which allows for the bees to enter, but keeps predators likes bears out.

Dr. Jennifer Babin-Fenske of Earthcare Sudbury supports in the initiative.

Renewables repositioning to meet mining industry’s energy needs – (MiningWeekly.com – September 16, 2014)

September 19, 2014

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

WASHINGTON – It is increasingly clear that mining and renewable energy are two businesses that belong together and, yet, figuring out the nuts and bolts of getting projects off the ground is not always easy.

For many renewable-energy companies, the slow pace of approving projects poses an ongoing challenge. “We have the skills the mining sector needs. The issue is getting momentum behind the mining sector to believe in these projects,” RES Canada microgrids manager Douglas McAlpine said.

Mark Bongiovanni, mining and metals sales manager for Schneider Electric, in Canada, pointed out that generalisations were difficult to make owing to each mining company and even each individual mining site, operating under its own unique set of considerations.

He noted that the diversity of the cost of energy in each country was what was driving development. In companies where it was difficult to get energy to the mine site, whether it was diesel, gas or the electrical grid, there was increased interest in looking at how to generate power locally.

“Ultimately, it’s a value proposition that each company – and, in some cases, each site – needs to evaluate for its own needs,” Bongiovanni said.

Raglan mine: Canada’s first industrial-scale wind and energy storage facility – by Henry Lazenby (MiningWeekly.com – August 22, 2014)

August 22, 2014

http://www.miningweekly.com/page/americas-home

WASHINGTON – The decision to install a 3 MW wind turbine at Glencore’s Raglan mine came after nearly five years of careful investigation, assessment, and analysis, says Jean-Francois Verret, director of strategy, projects, and public affairs.

Because of the Arctic conditions at the mining site, which sits on the Ungava Peninsula, in Nunavik, roughly 1 800 km north of Montreal, gathering in-depth data was an essential first step.

This summer, the Raglan mine began installing its first wind turbine, manufactured by Enercon, in Germany. If all goes as planned, Verret predicts that this wind turbine would replace about 5% of the mine’s diesel consumption – or 2.4-million litres of diesel.

A project like this also holds out the promise of significant cost savings. At the Raglan mine, energy typically accounts for 18% to 23% of operating costs. If the wind pilot goes well, Raglan was considering installing additional wind turbines that could generate a total of 9 MW to 12 MW of energy, slashing the mine’s overall diesel consumption by 40%.

In 2009, Raglan launched a study to investigate options for the mine and its fully diesel-powered operations. The nickel/copper mine’s remote locale meant that it would be impossible to connect to the hydroelectric grid or to the natural gas network.

Timmins’s Kidd Operations earn reclamation award – by Ron Grech (Timmins Daily Press – July 30, 2014)

July 30, 2014

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – As David Yaschyshyn leads the way towards the former jarosite pond site, a cool mild breeze carries a waft of clover from the field up ahead.

Yaschyshyn, the environmental manager at Kidd Operations (Glencore), points to the ground, noting the fresh moose tracks along the trail.

“Since the jarosite pond has been reclaimed and re-vegetated, we have seen hundreds of geese. We’ve seen bears and their cubs and even moose wandering across. So it really has been returned to nature. It’s now an open meadow ecosystem.”

Yaschyshyn isn’t exaggerating. The 50-hectare area that was once a dumping pond for a liquid byproduct of the zinc refinery process is now covered waist-high in wildflowers and native grasses.

The jarosite (iron sulphate mud) pond was built in 1971 and was used as part of the smelting process from 1972 until the refinery at the metallurgical site closed in 2010.

After that there was no use for the storage pond, so it was dewatered, dried, covered with layers of stones, gravel and dirt, before being sealed with a specially designed 60-millimetre thick plastic liner.

From wasteland to parkland: Mining greens up – by Daina Lawrence (Globe and Mail – April 22, 2014)

April 22, 2014

The Globe and Mail is Canada’s national newspaper with the second largest broadsheet circulation in the country. It has enormous influence on Canada’s political and business elite.

Today, the aerial view of the historic Coniaurum gold mine, owned by Goldcorp Inc. since 2002, more closely resembles a putting green on a golf course than an old mine site. But it didn’t always look like this.

For decades it was a wasteland of discarded rock – leftovers from its previous life as an active mine since 1913, until a storm in 1961 caused a breach in the tailings dams and shut down operations for good.

Past practices did not call for any closure or clean up of these sites, so for more than 30 years the Timmins, Ont.-based mine site sat almost untouched. But through a mergers and acquisition deal, Goldcorp Inc. inherited the historic mine (along with almost 20 others) and in 2005 the company began its multimillion-dollar reclamation project. It took three years and between $10-million and $12-million to complete, but the current property now grows plant life and even acts as home to a colony of beehives that aid in Coniaurum’s revegetation.

“The goal, with this property in particular, is to bring us back as close as possible to the original vegetation that would have been there before mining,” says Marc Lauzier, manager of Goldcorp’s Timmins property. “We have to do what’s right and do a complete mining cycle, which ends when you can return the land to its original state,” he adds.

First blast at [Timmins Goldcorp] open pit – by Jeff Labine (Timmins Daily Press – February 12, 2014)

February 12, 2014

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – Goldcorp literally started its operations at the Hollinger Mine with a bang. Residents were given advanced warning that the mining company would be blasting at Hollinger on Tuesday. The first blast was expected to take place around 11:30 a.m. but the window of opportunity was missed when it took too long to place the blast mats down.

The city made an agreement with Goldcorp/Porcupine Gold Mines to only blast during the destination windows. That placed the first blast at the second time slot – between 1:30 p.m. and 2 p.m.

Paul Miller, superintendent of surface operations for the Hollinger project, watched the blast from the top floor of Goldcorp’s office building, near the Shoppers Drug Mart along Algonquin Boulevard. Called a pioneering blast, the explosion is intended to level out the area for the company to work in.

“Its been a long time coming,” he said. “We look at it as the start. In terms of the community it is a significant event because it is our first blast.

Vale’s Clean AER project forges ahead – by Laura Gregorini (Northern Ontario Business – September 2013)

September 17, 2013

Established in 1980, Northern Ontario Business provides Canadians and international investors with relevant, current and insightful editorial content and business news information about Ontario’s vibrant and resource-rich North.

Installation of a converter at Vale’s Copper Cliff smelter in Sudbury, a major component of the company’s Clean AER Project, is nearly complete. The converter is the first of four converters to be replaced as part of the $1-billion project that will see sulphur dioxide, dust and metals emissions reduced by 85 per cent from current levels.

Citing volatile market conditions and cost challenges, Vale announced in January that it was scaling back the cost of its Clean AER (Atmospheric Emissions Reduction) project from $2-billion to $1- million. At the same time, Vale indicated it would move to a single-furnace operation from a two- furnace operation. Although a significantly less investment, Vale said that the environmental impact would be greater, by reducing emissions substantially more than previously anticipated.

“The original Clean AER project’s scope was designed for a two-furnace operation so it meant that when we made the decision, we had to go back and rescope the project to accommodate the one furnace,” said Vale spokesperson Angie Robson.

Vale doesn’t anticipate moving to a single furnace before 2016. A team was formed to study various aspects of the change and revise plans to accommodate the change to a single furnace.

[Timmins] Mine reclamation conference set to start – by Kyle Gennings (Timmins Daily Press – September 10, 2013)

September 10, 2013

The Daily Press is the city of Timmins broadsheet newspaper.

TIMMINS – The impact of mining and the importance of reclamation practices will be the topic of conversation over the next few days as Whish Ki Yak It 2013 kicks off on Tuesday morning.

The conference is a joint venture between AMAK, Goldcorp Porcupine Gold Mines, the University of Waterloo and Golder Associates and will host a number of key speakers which will comment on the current state of mining in the country.

“We are a partner on the final conference night for Wish Ki Yak It,” said Timmins Museum: National Exhibition Centre curator Karen Bachmann. “This is the final conference night and we’ve brought in Joseph Boyden a Canadian Author and the entire evening is geared as a cultural exchange.”

Participants will be introduced to reclamation on Tuesday morning with a tour of Goldcorps award winning Coniaurum Reclamation site, where the geomorphic approach, environmental monitoring and traditional ecological knowledge and traditional knowledge will be cross examined.

Canada’s new science minister wants green mining growth (QMI Agency – August 12th, 2013)

August 13, 2013

http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/home.html

OTTAWA – Newly appointed Minister of State for Science and Technology Greg Rickford gave a speech at the World Mining Congress Monday in which he referred to the industry as a “cornerstone of the Canadian economy” and iterated the need for continued growth.

He described how the feds have streamlined the regulatory process, eliminated redundant bureaucratic requirements and made project reviews more market sensitive.

But unlike other, similar speeches given by his Conservative comrades, Rickford’s emphasized environmental stewardship and the need for the mining industry to “(obtain) a social licence to operate.”

If the social licence can be defined as a trust among parties that all are benefiting satisfactorily and feel their priorities and concerns are taken into account, then the renewal of such a thing between the federal government, mining companies and the local communities they affect – namely First Nations – could prove invaluable. Because when it comes to the resource extraction industry in particular, public confidence in “the system” is abysmal, said Rob Roach, vice president of research at the Canada West Foundation.