Quebec Iron Ore assured on Tuesday that it had no choice but to fill eight tailings lakes for phase 2 of its Bloom Lake mine development.
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According to the company’s plan, excavation residues from phase 2, which will increase iron production to 15 million tonnes per year while generating 900 million tonnes of residues, cannot be stored on the land.
Despite an unfavorable opinion a year ago from the Bureau of Public Hearing in the Environment (BAPE), the mining company therefore intends to pour its residues into lakes.
“Once these projects are approved, well, we have to carry them out. So, essentially, what we do is inventory the ecological value that will be impacted by mining activity, and we have to compensate for it elsewhere,” explained Alexandre Belleau, head of operations at Iron Ore. Quebec.
This position rejects the environmental coalition Québec Meilleur Mine.
“We feel like we are going back not to the 20th century, but to the 19th century by dumping mine tailings into lakes. It’s not a way of doing things, it’s not modern, it’s not clean, it’s not responsible,” lamented the organization’s coordinator, Hugo Lapointe.
The latter judges that the mining company could return its mining residues to where they come from.
“Yes, it’s more complicated for the mining company, yes it’s tiring, but you have to do it, you have to demand it. There are several mines in Quebec that are already doing this,” he said.
The Minister of Natural Resources, Jonatan Julien, considers that the scenario of the spill in lakes is tolerable.
“What I understand […], is that the risks have been mitigated. It is certain that there remain certain risks, but it is the best solution in the context of a phase 2 in terms of economic development and sustainable development, ”he pleaded.
– With information from André Normandeau, TVA Nouvelles
Reference-www.journaldemontreal.com