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Mining Environmental Accidents, Pollution, Tailing Dams and Abandoned Mines

Miner gets year in prison for criminal violation of Clean Water Act – by Alex DeMarban (Alaska Dispatch News – March 31, 2016)

https://www.adn.com/

A federal judge on Thursday sentenced the operator of a platinum mine that discharged pollutants into a salmon-spawning river in Southwest Alaska to a year in prison and, following that, a year of supervised release.

The sentencing is part of the first federal case in Alaska charging a mining company and its key operators with criminal violations of the Clean Water Act.

James Slade, a Canadian resident who in 2010 and 2011 was chief operating officer of XS Platinum Inc., an Australian-led company, can spend the second year of his punishment — the supervised release — in Canada, said U.S. District Judge Sharon Gleason.

Gleason’s decision came after a sentencing hearing lasting almost four hours, and capped months of dispute between federal prosecutors and defendants in a major pollution case that has ensnared two other participants in the operation.

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Nevada backs priority Superfund status for toxic mine – by Scott Sonner (Elko Daily Free Press – March 31, 2016)

http://elkodaily.com/

Associated Press – RENO (AP) — Nevada is dropping its long-held opposition to having a World War II-era copper mine added to the priority list of the nation’s most polluted Superfund sites, Gov. Brian Sandoval said in a letter Tuesday to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Sandoval said he was reluctantly agreeing with the agency’s latest proposal, which would make $31 million available to help clean up the abandoned Anaconda mine.

The mine in Yerington, about 80 miles southeast of Reno, already is a federal Superfund site, a designation that brought federal help with containing pollution — some of it radioactive — and pinpointing its source.

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NEWS RELEASE: New Analysis: Ignoring best practices, four BC/Alaska transboundary mines risk repeating Mount Polley disaster

International coalition calls on BC to include Mount Polley investigation recommendations in mining code

Juneau, AK; Ottawa, ON; Washington, D.C., March 22 – In the midst of deliberations over the British Columbia Mining Code, an international coalition today released, Post-Mount Polley: Tailings Dam Safety in British Columbia, a new analysis revealing that four major BC mine projects in the Alaska/British Columbia transboundary region fail to implement the recommendations of the Mount Polley expert panel, risking similar mine waste containment disasters.

The Mount Polley mine disaster, considered the worst mine disaster in Canadian history, occurred in August 2014, releasing over 25 million cubic meters of mine waste into the Fraser River watershed.

The KSM, Galore Creek, Red Chris, and Schaft Creek mines would require mine waste dams 2 to 6 times higher than the failed Mount Polley dam, and would contain 7 to 27 times the waste volume. The waste from these four mines would be more toxic than the Mount Polley mine.

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WHO Tests Hair to Probe Uranium From Johannesburg Gold Mines – by Kevin Crowley (Bloomberg News – March 16, 2016)

http://www.bloomberg.com/

The World Health Organization is collecting hair samples west of Johannesburg to see if residents near South Africa’s biggest city are suffering from excessive uranium pollution due to ore dumps from 130 years of gold mining.

The Geneva-based United Nations unit will analyze hair samples from about 1,600 people living in neighborhoods near mine-waste dumps, mainly west of Johannesburg, it said in an e-mailed response to questions. Uranium, which can cause cancer, can be ingested through drinking contaminated water or inhaling dust.

“The objective is to study the environmental exposure to uranium and its decay products of the population living in close proximity to gold mine tailing dumps in and around Johannesburg,” the WHO said. “These residue areas are often densely populated and create the potential for substantial levels of exposure to uranium.”

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Soviet uranium legacy blights eastern EU – by Adrian Mogos and Michael Bird (Euobserver.com – March 14, 2016)

https://euobserver.com/

ROMANIA, CZECH REPUBLIC, GERMANY – The Soviet Union mined uranium across its empire for decades, leaving a legacy of environmental damage, social breakdown and widespread health issues. In the first of a two-part investigation, we reveal how the devastating effects are still being felt in Germany, Romania and the Czech Republic.

“We live here, with radon [radioactive gas] across the road and with chalk dust from down in the valley – God damn it – it will kill us all,” says 53-year-old Vasile Mocanu, a former miner.

He is describing how his life has been trapped between two sources of pollution – a uranium mine and a chalk mine. Baita Plai, an ex-Communist workers’ colony built by the Soviets in the 1950s, lies on the edge of the Transylvanian countryside, 500km north-west of Bucharest.

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Brazilian town devastated by dam burst wants mine reopened – by Marta Nogueira (Reuters U.K. – March 15, 2016)

http://uk.reuters.com/

MARIANA, BRAZIL – In November, Marcos de Freitas lost his home and everything he owned when a dam burst at a nearby mine released a flow of mud that buried his village.

Now, sitting in a house paid for by the company responsible, he wants the mine to reopen.

“I have nothing to complain about,” said the heavy set 55-year-old retired miner who fled his house, one of the oldest in the destroyed village of Bento Rodrigues, when the mud was up to his ankles.

“Samarco has to start producing again in order to create jobs,” he said. Samarco, which is jointly owned by Vale SA and BHP Billiton, is the mine operator.

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Fukushima five years on, and the lessons we failed to learn – by Dave Sweeney (The Guardian – March 10, 2016)

http://www.theguardian.com/

Five years ago this week the world held its breath, crossed its fingers and learnt a new word. Fukushima went from being the name of a provincial Japanese city to becoming global shorthand for a costly and contaminating nuclear disaster.

Fukushima means “fortunate island” but the region’s luck melted down along with the reactors on March 11, 2011. The subsequent system failure, meltdown and uncontrolled release of large volumes of radiation at the Tokyo Electric Power Corporation’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex has become one of the defining events of our age.

It was a game-changer that highlighted the urgent need for the game to change. As the country that supplied the fuel that made it happen, the events at Fukushima held – and still hold – profound implications for Australia.

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Exclusive: BHP/Vale’s Samarco sees mine restarting at 19 million tonnes – by Marta Nogueira (Reuters U.S. – March 10, 2016)

http://www.reuters.com/

BELO HORIZONTE, BRAZIL – Samarco, joint venture between Brazil’s Vale SA (VALE5.SA) and Australia’s BHP Billiton (BLT.L), expects to restart production at its iron ore mine in Minas Gerais by the start of the fourth quarter, its chief executive told Reuters on Thursday, less than a year after a burst tailings dam there killed 19 people.

CEO Roberto Carvalho said iron ore pellet production for the initial two to three years would likely be at a reduced 19 million tonnes per year as the company develops a long-term plan to store the mining waste known as tailings.

Before the dam disaster, Samarco was producing about 30 million tonnes per year. “All our focus is turning to the restart,” Carvalho said at the company’s headquarters in Belo Horizonte, the capital of Brazil’s mining heartland. “We have talked to our clients, they have given us all the help possible and are awaiting the return of Samarco.”

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Mining Firms Samarco, Vale and BHP Billiton Settle With Brazil Over Dam Disaster – by Paul Kiernan (Wall Street Journal – March 2, 2016)

http://www.wsj.com/

RIO DE JANEIRO—Mining companies responsible for a disastrous dam failure in Brazil last year signed an agreement with authorities Wednesday that could allow them to pay far less than the 20.2 billion Brazilian reais ($5.2 billion) originally sought by government lawyers.

Samarco Mineração SA and its parent companies, Brazilian mining giant Vale SA and Australia’s BHP Billiton Ltd., reached the settlement after weeks of haggling with federal and state authorities that had joined the lawsuit.

The deal represents a major milestone in the miners’ efforts to move past the Nov. 5 collapse of Samarco’s Fundão tailings dam, described by activists as the biggest accident of its kind. The dam released an avalanche of mud and mine waste that left 19 people dead and hundreds more homeless, as well as polluting some 400 miles of rivers in southeast Brazil’s Rio Doce basin.

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UPDATE 1-Samarco to pay 24 bln reais in damages for dam disaster – by Anthony Boadle (Reuters U.S. – March 2, 2016)

http://www.reuters.com/

Mining company Samarco and its owners, BHP Billiton and Vale SA, reached a deal with the Brazilian government on Wednesday to pay an estimated 24 billion reais ($6.2 billion) in damages for a deadly dam spill in November.

Of the total, Samarco will pay 4.4 billion reais through 2018 into a fund to cover the cleanup of the spill from the tailings dam. From 2019 to 2021, payments will be between 800 million reais and 1.6 billion reais.

Further investment will be made for a period of 15 years as the company agreed to a lengthy environmental plan to regenerate the impacted area through replanting and dredging.

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Teck Resources Trail smelter fined $3.4 million on pollution charges – by Derrick Penner (Vancouver Sun – March 1, 2016)

http://www.vancouversun.com/

Teck Resources Ltd.’s lead-zinc smelter at Trail has been fined $3.4 million for more than a dozen violations under the Environmental Management Acts related to releases of water with elevated levels of metals and chemicals, the company said.

The penalties were levelled at a sentencing hearing in Rossland Provincial Court Monday on two counts under the Environmental Management Act related to introducing business waste into the environment and failing to comply with its environmental permit.

Trail operations general manager Thompson Hickey described the incidents as “simply not acceptable,” in a news release and said the company has worked hard to improve its environmental protections.

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Vale in Sudbury gets cap-and-trade ‘holiday’ – Canadian Press (Sudbury Star – February 27, 2016)

http://www.thesudburystar.com/

Ontario’s Liberal government has released details of its cap-and-trade program, which is expected to increase the price of gas and homeowners’ natural gas bills, but gives some of the biggest polluters — including Vale Ltd. — a four-year “holiday.”

The government is putting a price on carbon of about $18 a tonne and capping emission allowances at roughly 142 metric tonnes per year in 2017, when the plan rolls out, according to a series of details contained both in Thursday’s budget and in draft regulations posted by the environment ministry.

The cap is expected to decline 4.17 per cent each year to 2020, when the Liberals hope to have achieved a 15-per-cent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions over 1990 levels.

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Mining firms in B.C. to face tougher penalties for health and safety failures – by Justine Hunter (Globe and Mail – February 25, 2016)

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/

VICTORIA — British Columbia is catching up with other provinces by introducing tougher penalties for mining companies that fail to comply with health and safety rules.

Energy and Mines Minister Bill Bennett introduced amendments to the Mines Act on Thursday that will give regulators new powers to levy financial penalties without having to go to court. As well, the courts will be able to impose more severe punishment including fines of up to $1-million and three-year jail terms.

It’s the latest in a string of measures to improve mining safety in the wake of the 2014 environmental disaster when a tailings pond collapsed at the Mount Polley copper and gold mine in central B.C.

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Samarco executives accused of homicide by Brazilian police over dam burst – by Cecilia Jamasmie (Mining.com – February 24, 2016)

http://www.mining.com/

Six top executives of iron ore miner Samarco, a joint venture between BHP Billiton (ASX:BHP) and Vale (NYSE:VALE), and one contractor have been accused of homicide over the deaths of 19 people who were killed in a dam burst last November.

Brazilian police in the state of Minas Gerais recommended “qualified homicide” charges for the chief executive of Samarco at the time, Ricardo Vescovi, and six others, local newspaper Veja reported (in Portuguese).

In Brazil only prosecutors, and not police, can legally bring criminal charges, but accusations from officials often precede formal charges.

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Alaskans awaken to issues of mining, salmon and rivers we share with Canada – by Melanie Brown (Alaska Dispatch News – February 21, 2016)

http://www.adn.com/

Melanie Brown works with Salmon Beyond Borders to advocate for healthy watersheds in Southeast Alaska.

Although my parents are from Western Alaska, I consider myself lucky to have been born in Sitka. Work opportunities took our family northward, but my life led me back to Southeast Alaska, where I have chosen to raise my children.

It is a rich life with all the rivers, land and sea have to offer. We have friends who are good about sharing what they have and we are happy to reciprocate. We migrate along with the salmon to Bristol Bay every summer to be with our blood relatives and our home-river, but returning to Juneau for winter “fits our skin.” Not long after moving back here however, we learned of a looming threat to Southeast waters.

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