Resource Development

On August 4th 2014, the tailings pond at Mount Polley mine breached. A newly estimated total of 10.6 million cubic meters of water, 7.3 million cubic meters of tailings solids, 6.5 million cubic meters of interstitial water (water contained within the rock and sediment) and 0.6 million cubic meters of construction materials were released into the environment.

A local state of emergency declared on August 6th still remains in place for the region (including Likely), although that is expected to be removed shortly once the tailings pond breach is closed.

On August 6th I provided a brief assessment of the conditions leading up to the Mount Polley disaster. At the end of the article I promised to seek answers to a number of questions that I had posed. The questions are reproduced here:

1)    What support is government offering to local communities including local First Nations to help fund this period of transition?

2)    Will there be any impacts on the Fraser River salmon run?

3)    What is the best practice in cleaning up a tailings pond spill, especially given the limited number of incidences in BC that this has happened (at this time Minister Bennett is saying this has never happened before in the province)?

4)    What contingency plans exist in government to help support its efforts financially to address this disaster, including if Imperial Metals declares we’re unable to pay for the cleanup?

5)    What role has the government’s cuts to enforcement and their approach to enforcement played in causing this accident?

6)    Are there other tailings ponds that should be red flagged?

I was fortunate to be able to visit the Mount Polley mine site including the base of the tailing pond breach on August 28th (see Figure 1). There I was able to witness the local environmental degradation first hand. Upon completion my tour of the mine site, I stopped in at the Secwepemc Sacred Fire and the Yuct Ne Senxiymetkwe Camp for an hour to listen to the concerns of those present. I had the enormous honour of being granted tobacco by a Secwepemc elder to throw on the scared fire.

Next on the agenda was as stop at the University of Northern British Columbia (UNBC) Dr. Max Blouw Quesnel River Research Centre. There I discussed ongoing research and monitoring initiatives being conducted by scientists working at the facility. After a quick trip to see the town of Likely, it was back to Williams Lake airport to return home to Victoria.

Figure 1: Map of the Mount Polley region showing the location of the various stops on my visit to the region.

In what follows, I detail what I have learned from my visit concerning the Mount Polley tailings pond disaster, offer a number of recommendations for, and provide a list of questions that I believe need to be addressed by, those involved in responding to this environmental, social and economic disaster.

I want to offer my sincere thanks to the Secwepemc for allowing me to visit the sacred fire and burn a tobacco offering. I am also extremely grateful to mill superintendent and mining engineer Doug Ablett, as well as Steve Robertson, Vice President Corporate Affairs for Imperial Metals (see photo to right), for spending more than two hours with me as we toured the mine, the mill and the vicinity of the tailings pond. Finally, I am grateful to local resident Jenny Howell,  and Sam Albers from the UNBC Research Station for spending time with me at the Quesnel River Research Centre.

The Breach

In the early morning hours of August 4 the Mount Polley Tailings pond breached. Area residents woke up to the sound of  water as the once two metre wide Hazeltine Creek became a raging fifty metre river of slurry (see video below). A aerial helicopter video survey taken later in the day clearly shows the scale of the environmental destruction. Polley Lake was plugged by tailings and debris, causing lake levels to rise by 1.7 metres. Hazletine Creek was destroyed and the tailings pond substantively drained into pristine Quesnel Lake, British Columbia’s deepest Lake. At its northern edge, Quesnel Lake drains into Quesnel River, a major tributary of the Fraser River.

Video 1: RCMP video of Hazeltine Creek the day after the breach (left); Caribou regional district aerial video of the area after the breach had occurred.

NASA satellite images taken before and after the breach (Figure 2) clearly indicate the route of the tailings. The widespread presence of suspended sediments in the now turbid Polley Lake is evident. A plume of suspended sediments is also seen emanating from the mouth of Hazeltine Creek where it enters Quesnel Lake (Figure 2).

Figure 2: NASA Landsat 8 satellite imagery taken before (left) and after (right) the Mount Polley mine tailings pond failure. The left image was taken on July 29, 2014 and the right image was taken on August 5, 2014, a day after the breach. Images taken from NASA image database where a sliding overlay is also available for direct before/after comparison.

The Initial Response

On August 7th  the B.C. Green Party and I called on the provincial government to require every mine in the province to undertake an independent engineering report of their tailings storage facilities. On August 15th, the BC Green Party went further by putting together a petition that called on the B.C government to:

Immediately establish a fully independent process to investigate the Mount Polley mine disaster; and require every mine in the province to undertake an immediate, fully independent engineering report of their tailings storage facilities.

The petition quickly garnered over 2000 signatures and became moot when on August 18th, the provincial government announced that it would do precisely what we had called for. We were quick to support the announcement of these independent reviews.

The independent review panel that will investigate the causes of the Mount Polley breach is made up of three distinguished engineers. The panel chair Dr. Norbert Morgenstern, is an Emeritus University Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Alberta. The other committee members are Dr. Dirk Van Zyl, a Professor at the University of British Columbia, Norman B. Keevil Institute of Mining Engineering, and Steven Vick, a consulting engineer from Colorado who has literally written the book on the planning, design and analysis of tailings dams. I am of the firm opinion that British Columbians should have every degree of confidence that this blue-ribbon panel will come to the bottom of what caused the breach to occur. But this panel will not deal with questions concerning the clean up and long term environmental monitoring response.

One question that I have for this panel concerns the extent to which water levels in the tailings pond were too high. Tailings are typically released into ponds along the boundary of the pond. The water runs away from the dam leaving a beach of tailings behind. Such beaches provide extra buttressing for the earthen dams. Figure 3 is a high resolution image taken from Google Earth. A beach is clearly evident at the site where the breach occurred on August 4th. Looking at Figure 2, taken a few days before the breach, no beach is present there and the water level appears to be high.

Figure 3: High resolution Google Earth image of the Mount Polley tailings pond showing a tailings beach and the location of the eventual breach.

The British Columbia Ministry of Environment has done an admirable job regularly reporting water, fish, sediment and other analyses in their Mount Polley incident updates. In addition, Imperial Metals is holding regular meetings with local residents to provide updates and answer their questions. Residents shared their concerns with me during my visit regarding long term monitoring of air, water and aquatic life in the region.

With debris blocking the outflow from Polley Lake to Hazeltine Creek a potentially urgent situation arose. Water levels began to rise in Polley Lake and Imperial Metals was concerned that another breach would occur at the plug. As such they installed a pipeline that allowed Polley Lake to drain downstream into the now widened Hazeltine Creek. One is left with the question as to why Polley Lake was not directly drained in to Quesnel Lake instead of via Hazeltine Creek?

The company has been working to fill in the breach. On my visit, I witnessed a flurry of activity and a steady stream of massive haul trucks bringing rock and boulders to a growing dyke designed to fill gap  where there was once an earthen dam. Nevertheless, on September 9, the Ministry of Environment wrote to Mount Polley Mining Corporation finding them “to be out of compliance with the Environmental Management Act (EMA) because effluent was still discharging from the tailings storage facility into Hazeltine Creek.”

Figure 4: Photographs taken at the base of the tailings pond breach showing (left) a pipeline transporting water from Polley Lake to Hazeltine Creek and (right) what remains of a forest that was destroyed immediately in front of the breach.

The left panel of Figure 4 clearly shows open space where once there used to be forest. The trees that were uprooted during the breach ended up along the side and at the mouth of the now much wider pathway for Hazeltine Creek, as well as in Mitchell Bay just south of where Hazeltine Creek joins Quesnel Lake.  The company is presently harvesting those trees and sorting them for sawmills, pulp and hog fuel. Another question I have is where the revenue arising from the harvesting of these trees is being directed?

Mount Polley Mine and Tailings Ponds

The Mount Polley mineral deposit was first discovered in 1964 but it wasn’t until 1997, that Imperial Metals opened it’s mill and mine. The Copper/Gold/Silver mine was initially quite small, processing only about 18,000 tons of ore per day. By 2001, the mill shut down production but was reopened again in 2005, after the discovery of  new high grade ore deposits on the property. Since that time, aggressive exploration and expansion grew the mine to a point where it was processing 22,000 tons of ore per day and expected to produce  44,000,000 pounds of copper, 47,000 ounces of gold and 120,000 ounces oz silver in 2014. Magnetite is also produced at Mount Polley in partnership with Craigmont Industries (Figure 5).

Mount Polley’s alkalic porphyry (igneous [originating from magma] rock containing crystals) large, low-grade and heterogeneous copper-gold deposit is mined from two open pits (Figure 5) and one underground mine. The mine site was expected to be open until 2025 and prior to the breach, it was a closed system with all water remaining on site. Imperial Metals undertakes progressive reclamation of its waste rock and mine sites including applying Metro Vancouver biosolids on the disturbed areas. As noted in their 2013 Annual Information Form:

“Reclamation work in 2013 included: re-contouring of a total of 4.94 hectares; till/soil placement on 7.84 hectares; grass seeding on 1.81 hectares; and tree/shrub planting on 3.30 hectares. On the North Bell dump, 2.34 hectares also received an application of biosolids provided by Greater Vancouver Regional District. The total area reclaimed (including trees and shrubs) to date on site is 25.41 hectares. Site preparation consisted of re-sloping and contouring of the area, which was followed by soil application, landform design and hand seeding and planting”

Figure 5: (top left) Photograph oft Mount Polley’s Caribou pit (in the foreground)  and Springer pit (in the background).  (top right) Close up of Caribou fault along the wall of Caribou pit. (bottom) Magnetite piles.

Non-leaching, non-acid generating rock is mined at Mount Polley. This is ground in three stages and washed through a gravity circuit and then fed through a froth floatation circuit.  At this stage the ore-bearing minerals are skimmed off and what is left are tailings (sand- and silt- like solids) and waste water, combined with very small quantities of residual chemicals (Potassium amyl xanthate, W22C, and Sodium Hydrosulphide) used in the frothing process. The tailings are relatively benign upon release.

Leaving tailings exposed on the land can be problematic as oxidation and runoff (after rain) can create highly problematic acidic conditions in the neighbouring environment. Tailing ponds are designed to keep the tailings under water to prevent exposure to the atmosphere (and hence oxidation). Oxidation of sulphides present in the tailings can produce sulphuric acid. Typically, lime is added to the tailings in order to neutralize the acidity.

The water in Mount Polley’s tailing pond, fortunately, was basic and not acidic prior to the breach (a pH of about 8.5). As such, the release would not have put substantive quantities of acid into Quesnel Lake. Compare this to the Aznalcóllar Tailing Pond Disaster that occurred on April 25th, 1998 at the Boliden Apirsa mine in southern Spain. About 5.5 million cubic metres of highly acidic water (with a pH of between 2 and 4) and 1.5 cubic metres of tailings escaped through the breach and into the Agrio River and its  watershed.

Sacred Fire

Secwepemc Sacred Fire was lit on August 18th and the Yuct Ne Senxiymetkwe Camp set up shortly thereafter. I had the honour of chatting with people at the campsite. While there, a number of area residents also stopped by to support those holding vigil.

I wanted to hear from everyone present as to what they believe should be done, both in the short and long term, in response to the tailings pond breach. I found the requests to be well thought out and entirely reasonable.

Here is what I was told, in no particular order. Obviously these are not all inclusive and they are only based on the views of the people I spoke with:

1. The immediate establishment of an expert monitoring team that includes triggers for action if monitoring reveals a potential health or environmental problem;
2. Consultation with local First Nations and residents about what should be monitored. The expert team needs local knowledge to inform them about what is important to people in the region;
3. A bottom-up crisis response team which will assist people with questions, concerns, and dealing with the disaster;
4. Effective communication from Imperial Metals and the BC Government;
5. “Do what you say”. Building trust is crucial in moving forwards. If Imperial Metals or the BC Government say they will do something, locals want confidence that it will be done;
6. Keep the water out of Quesnel Lake. The people were concerned that Polley Lake overflow was being piped into Hazeltine Creek instead of directly to Quesnel Lake;
7. Set up an independent panel of experts, locals and First Nation representatives to determine the best path forward with respect to response and remediation .

UNBC Dr. Max Blouw Quesnel River Research Centre

The University of Northern British Columbia has a research station located along the banks of the Quesnel river just after it leaves Quesnel Lake. In response to the Mount Polley disaster, they initiated a water, sediment and biological sample collection program and will report back with their initial results at their open house on October 4.

It’s clear to me that researchers at the centre have very real concerns that contaminated, sediment-laden water will enter the Quesnel River system periodically. Given that this is a salmon bearing river and a major tributary for the Fraser River, I believe it is important that their monitoring efforts be supported and studied carefully.

There have been reports of a turbidity plume in Quesnel Lake 35-50 metres below the surface. In addition, a recent study by Laval et al. (2008) observed the occurrence of upwelling events at the outflow of Quesnel Lake to Quesnel River. Such occurrences happen in the summertime when the lake is stratified and are thought to be caused by episodic wind events. Were such upwelling events to occur, as has been observed in the past, the turbid subsurface Quesnel Lake waters could be brought to the surface and exported into the Quesnel River. In my discussions with the UNBC researchers, they described recently observing precisely such an event shortly before my visit. Over the course of just 15 seconds, waters entering Quesnel River dropped by 5°C and their turbidity rose dramatically.  The  source of this cold, turbid pulse had to come from subsurface waters in Quesnel Lake.

So where do we go from here?

Political Cost

There have been a number of newspaper stories pointing out that Imperial Metals, its controlling shareholder and Mount Polley were all major donors to the BC Liberal Party (see for example a Vancouver Observer article). Imperial Metals was a very minor donor to the BC NDP as well. But the BC NDP also received substantial donations from the United Steelworkers Union, the union that represents workers at the Mout Polley mine. In fact, Stephen Hunt, USW District 3 (Western Canada) Director, specifically called for USW members to support the BC NDP in the May 2013 election.

Federally, unions, corporations and foreigners are not allowed to make contributions to election campaigns or political parties. Individuals are only allowed to donate up to $1,200 annually. This is not the case in British Columbia. Any business, union or individual anywhere in the world can contribute any amount to any political party any time they wish.

Of course, foreigners, corporations and unions don’t vote. People do. That is why I continue to advocate for provincial electoral financing reform that would ban corporate and union donations and limit the allowable contributions from individuals.

Governmental Cost

In 2001 after the BC Liberals were elected to their first term, they began a comprehensive core review to cut the size of government. Premier Campbell asked all government departments to prepare scenarios as to what it would look like with 20%, 35% and 50% cuts to spending. At the time, revenue to the province from the oil and gas sector was substantive. As such, when the Ministry of Energy and Mines had to implement their cuts, they targetted them almost exclusively in the mining sector. One former senior administrator I talked with said that the in the end, the Ministry was asked to cut its budget by 30%. But that meant little, if any, cuts to energy and nearly 70% cuts to mines.

As a member of the School of Earth and Ocean Sciences at the University of Victoria, I have a very vivid memory of the decimation that occurred within the BC Geological Survey at the time. The mining enforcement and compliance budget was also severely cut back. For example, a recent story in the Vancouver Sun pointed out that the Mount Polley tailings pond only required a “critical dam safety review every 10 years by an independent engineer.” Concern also exists as to the ability of Imperial Metals to pay for the cleanup and the extent to which the public is left to pick up the tab for any remediation measures.

After meeting with a number of former Ministry executives, I arranged for a meeting with the BC Auditor General. I asked them to see if, in light of the Mount Polley accident, they would be willing to investigate the effects of the early cuts over the last decade to mining regulatory compliance and enforcement initiatives. I look forward to hear whether or not this will occur in the weeks and months ahead.

It seems clear to me, however, that independent of any review by the Auditor General, government needs to take a hard look at the extent to which it ensures that resource-extraction companies have sufficient indemnities, or have put aside large enough bonds, to ensure that taxpayers are not on the hook for any potential industry-based disaster. At the same time, enforcement and compliance measures need to be stepped up and adequately funded in the various ministries responsible for public oversight of resource projects in the province.

Social Cost

Let us not forget the social cost of the Mount Polley tailing pond disaster. There are 370 local residents employed at Mount Polley mine. While many of these residents are still working as the company scrambles to deal with the breach, the mill is not operating. More and more layoffs will happen in the near future. And then there are the social costs that are less easy to quantify. These include the potential real or perceived effects that the spill will have on the local eco-tourism industry.

As noted by those who I talked to at the Sacred Fire, the establishment of a bottom-up crisis response team that will assist people with questions, concerns, and dealing with the disaster might help those immediately affected.

Environmental Cost

The numerous pictures above paint a clear picture of the immediate environmental damage caused by the breach. Hazeltine Creek has been destroyed, as has the south end of Polley Lake. Tailings have entered Quesnel Lake and Polley Lake. While recognizing what has happened, two questions emerge:

1. What will be the long term consequences to the region?
2. What should be done in terms of remediation?

To answer the first, we need to recognize that one of the primary concerns of residents in the region is the potential effects that the tailings will have on salmon spawning grounds. Another concern relates to whether or not the water in Quesnel Lake will become contaminated.

With respect to the first concern, respected UBC Fisheries Scientist Carl Walters noted that “I still don’t think it will be a serious problem, but I just can’t say for sure“. With respect to the latter, it is almost certain that once the tailings sediments settle out to the bottom of the very deep Quesnel Lake, they will be stable. Furthermore, naturally-occurring sedimentation would eventually bury them. For example, Pedersen (1983) examined the tailings that were placed at the bottom of Buttle Lake in Strathcona Park and found them to be very stable.

Moving forward, I fully support the suggestion of setting up an independent panel of experts, locals and First Nation representatives to determine the best path forward with respect to response and remediation. It may turn out that remediation could be as simple as covering the tailings at Hazeltine Creek with soil and replanting trees; it may turn out to be much, much more. But that should be determined by an arms length panel of scientific experts, locals and First Nations.

As a summary, it looks like the British Columbia may have dodged a bullet. While not making light of the disaster, it could have been a lot worse. Non-leaching, non-acid generating rock were mined at Mount Polley; the water in the tailings pond was not acidic; Quesnel Lake is very deep. Were such a breach to have occurred at another mine, we may not have been so fortunate.

Economic cost

An editorial in the Northern Miner, a highly regarded source for mining news, described the Mount Polley tailing pond breach as the “the most depressing thing to have happened in Canadian mining since the Bre-X Minerals debacle in 1997“. In my view, the economic ramification of this disaster is likely to be the longest lasting and potentially most damaging result arising from Mount Polley breach. As noted above, British Columbia potentially dodged a bullet from an environmental perspective. But if such an accident can occur at the operations of a well-established and highly regarded mining company, imagine what other potential accidents are lurking out there.

I am pleased that the British Columbia government has “issued an order to all mining companies to conduct a Dam Safety Inspection for every tailings storage facility at a permitted mine by Dec. 1, 2014.” But let us not forget, it is critical that the ministry responsible for mining be funded adequately to ensure that they have sufficient staff and resources for their regulatory compliance and enforcement measures.

After all, we all know that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

References:

Laval, B.E., J. Morrison, D.J. Potts, E.C. Carmack, S. Vagle, C. James, F.A. McLaughlin and M Foreman, 2008:Wind-driven summertime upwelling in a fjord-type lake and its impact on downstream river conditions: Quesnel Lake and River, British Columbia, Canada, Journal of Great Lakes Research, 34 (1), 89–203.

Pedersen, T.F., 1983: Dissolved heavy metals in a lacustrine mine tailings deposit—Buttle lake, British Columbia. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 14(7), 249–254.

VICTORIA, B.C. – In light of the tragic industrial disaster at Mount Polley Mine south of Quesnel, the B.C. Green Party is calling on the provincial government to require every mine in the province to undertake an independent engineering report of their tailings storage facilities.

“The B.C. government has the legislative ability to require these engineering reports be submitted” said Andrew Weaver Oak Bay-Gordon Head MLA, and Deputy Leader of the B.C. Green Party. “Furthermore the BC government has the responsibility to ensure that other tailings ponds are not at risk of failure. By analyzing those facilities and publishing the results, they will go a long way towards reassuring British Columbians that their government is looking out for their best interests.”

As the effort to address the immediate needs of the community and the environment in the area around the Mount Polley Tailings Pond disaster continues, the government must also turn their attention to other communities across British Columbia who may be facing similar risks.

“I spoke with First Nations leaders in this territory. I learned of their frustration due to the lack of communication by the government and operator, they are not getting any information,” said Adam Olsen, Leader of the B.C. Green Party. “They are very concerned about this situation and shared the fear that this will not be the only disaster.”

“This has been a wake up call for us all,” said Weaver. “The Minister admitted this accident should not have happened and it goes without saying we need a comprehensive assessment of our situation.”

Section 18 of the BC Mines Act empowers the government to order a mine operator to provide an independent study prepared by an engineer respecting the health and safety of its “equipment, buildings workings or structures…”.

“The provincial government should start with the Gibraltar mine just north of WIlliams Lake,” said Olsen. “People are really concerned with a toxic mining slurry making its way to the Fraser River, and so they should be, as it has the potential to shut down one of the largest sockeye runs in the world – forever. We could all rest a little easier knowing that facility is sound.”

Mount Polley Tailings Pond Breach

Looking at the pictures in the news this week of the environmental disaster that took place in central BC takes your breath away. I felt it was important to write a detailed review of what we know now and what questions need to be asked going forward. I will provide as much information I can as things develop.

In the early morning of  Monday, August 4^th 2014, a 4km long tailings pond located at the Mount Polley gold and copper mine (located in central British Columbia) breached its earthen dam, and left a 45-metre wide track of muck running into the nearby lake near Likely, BC. The mine and tailings pond is owned and operated by Imperial Metals Corporation. In a press release on August 5^th 2014, the company said the cause of the breach is unknown at this time, and the structure (which was independently built) was operated within the parameters given to the company, as regulated by the Ministry of Energy and Mines.

A state of emergency was declared for the Cariboo region in the morning of August 6^th.

The breach released ~10 billion litres of water and 4.5 million cubic metres of silt into Polley Lake prompting drinking water warnings for Quesnel Lake, Polley Lake, Hazeltine Creek, Cariboo Creek and the Quesnel River up to its intersection with the Fraser River.

In an FAQ on tailings pond, CBC says that:

“The substances found in tailings ponds depend on the type of mining operation. Last year, Imperial Metals Corp. reported that tailings from its Mount Polley copper-gold mine contained thousands of tonnes of copper, zinc, phosphorus and managanese along with:

• 138 tonnes of cobalt, 71 tonnes of nickel, 3.6 tonnes of antimony, 84,831 kilograms of arsenic, 38,218 kilograms of lead, 8,695 kilograms of selenium, 562 kilograms of mercury, 995 kilograms of cadmium.”

A science and policy advisor for the David Suzuki Foundation says that the most hazardous heavy metals to human and environmental health are arsenic, cadmium, copper, lead and mercury.

The breach appeared to catch the president of Imperial Metals by surprise, as he denied any indication that the dam would burst. In a town hall, Brian Kynoch said “if you asked me two weeks ago if it could happen, I would have said it couldn’t.”

However, this dam has been the subject of at least one review commissioned by the Williams Lake First Nation and Imperial Metals in 2009 and published in 2011. In the report, Brian Olding, operator of Brian Olding and Associates Ltd. (the environmental consultant that was retained for the report), said the tailings pond was accumulating water so quickly that it would have needed to discharge about 1.4 million cubic metres of water a year to keep its levels stable. This would require the dam to find a sustainable means of discharging water to prevent excessive build up. Oldings assessment found the pond levels were already getting too high five years ago.

In 2012, the government granted the permit amendment that Imperial Mines had requested, allowing it to discharge 1.4 million cubic meters of wastewater per year into Hazeltine Creek. The second permit amendment, submitted this summer, was under consideration by the ministry at the time of the tailings pond breach.

The report was also critical of the company for not having a contingency plan in case of a tailings pond failure. I do not know whether such a plan was developed in the period between the report being submitted to the company and government, and the accident on Monday. It is also worth noting that Olding says no analysis of the dam’s structural integrity was conducted, despite his request that a structural engineering company be retained.

An initial CBC investigation into the accident also provided a detailed review of the BC Government’s interactions with the Mount. Polley Mine.

In the article, the BC Ministry of Environment claims that they warned Imperial Metals about the Mount Polley mine tailings pond levels repeatedly before the breach.

In an email to CBC News, a Ministry of Environment spokesperson said it gave the firm its latest of five warnings in May, this time for exceeding the permitted height of wastewater within the tailings pond. However these warnings may have been given over the course of many years, referring to different incidences and violations.

The first of these, in 2009, prompted the independent report referred to above.

The CBC article went on to report that the B.C. Ministry of Environment reported conducting 14 inspections of the Mount Polley mine since the permit amendment was granted. On one of these inspections, that took place in August 2012, the ministry found the mine failed to report the excessive height of wastewater for the perimeter pond. The pond subsequently overflowed, releasing ~150 cubic meters of wastewater over 13 hours.

In April of this year, the ministry found the mine experienced high flows due to spring runoff, which blocked the pump system, resulting in an overflow, for which an advisory was issued. In this case the water did not reach the creek.

Finally, three months ago the ministry warned Imperial Metals yet again, after the height of wastewater in the tailings pond exceeded authorized levels.

According to the ministry, the wastewater level eventually returned to normal one month later.

In summer 2014, the firm applied to amend its permit again, this time to allow a discharge of 3 million cubic metres of treated wastewater or ditch water into Polley Lake, which overflows into Hazeltine Creek.

At least one journalist is pointing out that although the initial reaction is to blame the company, “the buck really stops with the province”, which is responsible for the regulatory culture in the province.

Stephen Hume notes that accidents like this (although not to this scale) have been happening repeatedly. In his article he cites a warning given in 2012 by The University of Victoria’s Environmental Law Centre, which noted that environmental assessment certificates for mines issued by government are often “vague and unenforceable.” Furthermore, it said that by 2008 the number of mine inspections had fallen to half what they were in 2001 and Ministry of Environment staff shrank by 25 per cent.

This is an accident that should not have happened. The warning signs were there, and yet no action took place. How many warnings must the government issue to a company before more significant action is taken? We need to ensure that the government has the necessary regulatory teeth and resources to act to prevent disasters such as the one that occurred at Mount Polley.

Going forward, we need to ensure that our first priority is that the health and well being of those affected is being looked after. This needs to include ensuring that the short term financial needs of local communities including First Nations are met, as many people find themselves without an income, and with new costs.

From the government’s side, we are still waiting for their report on the water quality in the area. In the government’s press release, the Ministry of Environment said it was on-site conducting water tests to determine the full extent of potential environmental impacts. Water sampling took place the evening of August 4^th with samples having been sent for analysis, and results expected later this week. I have called on the Minister of Environment to consider independent testing to reassure local residents and those potentially affected downstream that the information is complete and impartial.

Following this, we need to start addressing how clean up of this disaster will occur, including short and long term mitigation of impacts on humans and the environment.

I will be working hard on this issue in the weeks and months that follow. At the moment I have a number of questions that I will be seeking answers to, including:

1)    What support is government offering to local communities including local First Nations to help fund this period of transition?

2)    Will there be any impacts on the Fraser River salmon run?

3)    What is the best practice in cleaning up a tailings pond spill, especially given the limited number of incidences in BC that this has happened (at this time Minister Bennett is saying this has never happened before in the province)?

4)    What contingency plans exist in government to help support its efforts financially to address this disaster, including if Imperial Metals declares we’re unable to pay for the cleanup?

5)    What role has the government’s cuts to enforcement and their approach to enforcement played in causing this accident?

6)    Are there other tailings ponds that should be red flagged?

Please don’t hesitate to contact my office if you have any questions.

Media Statement: August 6, 2014
Testing and Cleanup is the priority for Mount Polley mine breach
For Immediate Release

Victoria B.C. – The tailings pond breach at the Mount Polley copper and gold mine near Likely B.C. is estimated to have released 10 billion litres of potentially contaminated water, and 4.5 million cubic metres of metals-laden fine sand. All of the mine tailings are an eco – system and financial risk flowing into the creeks, rivers and lakes of the Cariboo region, possibly into the Fraser system, just as salmon return This is an unprecedented situation for the province, with both the company and the government appearing ill-prepared to respond.

Stark warnings to the residents of the region: ‘do not even touch the water’ and now, two days after the breach, a local state of emergency has been declared. The immediate concern is ensuring downstream drinking water is safe for use, Longer term, there are questions on how far the contaminated sediment will spread through the river and lake systems, the potential effects on groundwater and on fisheries and wildlife.

“The problem now is not what we do know, but what we don’t know” said Andrew Weaver. “I have asked the Minister of Environment to consider independent testing of the water and sediment mixture to reassure local residents, and everyone potentially affected downstream, that the information is complete and impartial”

Media Contact
Mat Wright – Press Secretary, Andrew Weaver MLA
mat.wright@leg.bc.ca
1 250 216 3382

Thank you to everyone who participated in our first polling question using PoliSourceBC. The final results of the poll are listed below. Our next poll touches on an issue that I have written extensively about on this site (type coal into the search bar above for a list of articles).

“Burning thermal coal to produce electricity is the world’s biggest single source of greenhouse gas emissions. Washington, Oregon and California States are taking steps to halt the expansion of thermal coal exports through their ports. Do you believe that BC should take similar steps to halt the expansion of thermal coal exports through its ports?”

To participate in this poll please click here.

RESULTS OF PREVIOUS POLL

“Do you support the Green Party of BC policy to add a 6th condition for the approval of resource development applications? Condition #6 would be: No diluted bitumen in tanks on BC coastal waters.”

The poll ran from March 4 to March 24, 2014 and there were 273 responses as follows:

• Yes – 237 (87%)
• No – 27 (10%)
• Other – 9 (3%)

Approximately 20% of the responses were from constituents, according to postal code data.