Canadian police on Tuesday raided the offices of Imperial Metals to gather information in connection with the Mount Polley tailings dam collapse, four days after a government-sponsored report concluded a design problem was the root cause of the dam failure.
The Mount Polley tailings dam was designed in the early 1990s by the multinational engineering firm Knight Piésold. The company turned over responsibility for the dam to AMEC in 2011. Both companies are playing a central role in the design of the dry stack tailings dump at the proposed Rosemont copper mine southeast of Tucson.
The search warrant was executed as part of a joint investigation by Environment Canada, its enforcement branch, Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the RCMP, B.C. Conservation Office inspector Chris Doyle told the Vancouver Sun.
Imperial Metals confirmed late Tuesday a search warrant was executed on its offices in downtown Vancouver and at the Mount Polley mine site near Likely in the B.C. Interior, 100 kilometres northeast of Williams Lake, the Vancouver Sun reported.
In a second story, the Vancouver Sun asked if search warrants had been executed on Knight Piésold or AMEC. “I can’t comment on any other particulars due to the ongoing nature of the investigation,” Doyle told the Sun.
In a written response, AMEC spokeswoman Lauren Gallagher said no search warrant has been executed at any AMEC office (AMEC is now known as Amec Foster Wheeler), the Sun reported.
Knight Piésold could not be reached for comment.
The Independent Expert Engineering Investigation and Review Panel Report on the Mount Polley Tailings Storage Facility Breach released last Friday “concluded that the dominant contribution to the failure resides in the design,” according to a media briefing.
Knight Piésold’s design did not account for the presence of a glacial lake deposit beneath the tailings dam foundation, the Sun reported.
Friday’s report reveals Knight Piésold knew about the glacial till after it did boring tests, but decided the deposit was spotty and would “not adversely affect the dam stability”, the CBC reports.
“They misinterpreted the test results and didn’t really understand the nature of the strength, and the nature of how it could get weaker, and the nature how in fact, it did, fail,” Jack Caldwell, a leading North American expert in the field of tailings dams, told the CBC.
The tailings dam collapse has generated widespread demands for fundamental reform in Canada’s mining regulations. The expert panel of engineers stated “the panel firmly rejects any notion that business as usual can continue.”
Chief Ann Louie, of the Williams Lake Indian Band, called on the province to act quickly on the report’s findings. “B.C. needs mining reform in the worst way,” Ms. Louie told the Toronto Globe and Mail.
Both AMEC and Knight Piésold are playing a significant role in the design of the proposed Rosemont mine dry stack tailings facility. AMEC is the lead designer on what would become the largest dry stack dump in the world. AMEC has hired Knight Piésold as a subcontractor to conduct tests on materials that would be impounded in the Rosemont tailings dump.
The Arizona Department of Environmental Quality raised concerns over the design of Rosemont’s tailing facility in an April 14, 2010 letter to the Rosemont Copper Company. ADEQ requested additional testing after it determined that the previous “assessment of physical and engineering properties of the dry stack tailings…is inadequate.”
ADEQ was particularly concerned about the possible impact of shallow ground water on the stability of the tailings dump.
“The central portion of the Dry Stack Tailings appears to be situated just above the ground water level,” ADEQ stated. The state agency asked Rosemont to provide additional data to show how the shallow groundwater table would effect the “structural integrity of the tailings pile.”
AMEC turned to Knight Piésold to undertake an analysis of soil materials that would be used in the Rosemont tailings facility in response to ADEQ’s request.
Despite the concerns over the proximity of ground water to the tailings dump, ADEQ issued Rosemont an Aquifer Protection Permit.
According ADEQ, the permit is issued to “a facility that discharges a pollutant either directly to an aquifer, to the land surface or the vadose zone (the area between an aquifer and the land surface) in such a manner that there is a reasonable probability that the pollutant will reach an aquifer.”
THANK YOU FOR CONFIRMING THE INFORMATION REGARDING THE POLICE RAIDS ON THE MOUNT POLLEY VANCOUVER OFFICES OF IMPERIAL METALS AND MINE SITE WHICH I PREVIOUSLY REPORTED TO YOU .
IT IS TIME TO FOCUS MORE DIRECTLY ON THE ROSEMONT COPPER PROPERTY AND HUDBAY’S CURRENT ACTIVITIES WHICH ARE INTENDED TO BRING IT INTO PRODUCTION . HUDBAY WILL BE HARD TO STOP . IT WAS EASY TO GET RID OF AUGUSTA IN COMPARISON AS THEY WERE BROKE AND HAD THEIR BAGS PACKED WHEN HUDBAY CAME ALONG AS THEIR WHITE KNIGHT .
THE MOUNT POLLEY TAILINGS DISASTER HAS GONE AROUND THE WORLD MORE THAN ONCE AND HAS EXPOSED THE MANY UGLY FACETS OF THE MINING INDUSTRY . MOUNT POLLEY WAS A MARGINAL MINE AT BEST WHICH RESULTED IN TAKING SHORT CUTS AND COST SAVING MEASURES RESULTING IN A ” HIGH RISK ” MINING OPERATION . IN DESPERATION FOR MUCH NEEDED CASH TO PAY BILLS AT THE IMPERIAL METALS RED CHRIS MINE , ALSO IN BC , HIGHER GRADE ORE FROM THE UNDERGROUND WORKINGS AT MOUNT POLLEY WAS FORCED THROUGH THE MILL RESULTING IN A SURGE IN THE TAILINGS WHICH HELPED TO TRIGGER THE COLLAPSE OF THE TAILINGS DAM .
WHAT IS VERY IMPORTANT IS :- ” WHAT HAS BEEN LEARNED FROM THE MOUNT POLLEY DISASTER AND HOW CAN THIS BE APPLIED TO THE ROSEMONT COPPER PROJECT ?” MOUNT POLLEY WILL BE IN THE NEWS FOR A LONG TIME TO COME AND THERE WILL BE COURT CASES THAT DRAG ON . WILL ANYTHING CHANGE ? PROBABLY NOT ! IMPERIAL METALS IS IN BED WITH THE BC LIBERAL GOVERNMENT WHICH HAS APPARENTLY GIVEN THE GREEN LIGHT FOR THE RED CHRIS MINE TO START OPERATING . POLITICAL PRESSURES ARE BEING APPLIED IN ORDER TO GET THE MONT POLLEY MINE BACK IN OPERATION . IT IS ALL ABOUT THE ECONOMY , JOBS , TAX REVENUES AND NOTHING ABOUT ENVIRONMENTAL/POLLUTION ISSUES AS THESE COST MONEY AND DO NOT MAKE MONEY .
THE PERMITTING OF THE ROSEMONT PROPERTY IS DEFINITELY MOVING IN HUDBAY’S FAVOUR . EVERY PERMIT , HOWEVER SMALL , IS A FEATHER IN HUDBAY’S HAT . THE FACT THAT ” DRY STACKED TAILINGS ” HAS BEEN PROPOSED FOR ROSEMONT IS ALSO A PLUS . HOWEVER , QUESTIONS REMAIN AS TO WHETHER THEY WILL BE ABLE TO HANDLE A LARGE SCALE OPEN-PIT OPERATION AS PROPOSED . LARGE VOLUMES OF WASTE WATER WILL BE PRODUCED BY THE FILTERING PROCESS AND ALL OF THIS WATER MUST BE RETAINED , TREATED AND RECYCLED . THIS LEAVES THE ” DRY TAILINGS ” AND WASTE ROCK TO BE DISPOSED OF . THE DRY STACKED TAILINGS WILL BE LAYERED BY THE VERY NATURE OF THE VARIABILITY IN THE OREBODY , THE GRINDING , THE MILLING AND RECOVERY ACTIVITIES . RAIN WATER WILL SEEP INTO THE TAILINGS AND WILL FOLLOW THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE AS IT FINDS ITS WAY INTO THE NATURAL DRAINAGE SYSTEM . ANY RAIN WATER COMING INTO CONTACT WITH THE ” THE DRY STACKED TAILINGS ” WILL COMBINE WITH CHEMICAL RESIDUES AND PICK UP HEAVY METALS AND SPREAD THEM THROUGHOUT THE DRAINAGE . THE FACT THAT NO PROVISION HAS BEEN MADE FOR AN IMPERMEABLE MEMBRANE TO BE INSTALLED AT THE BASE OF THE ” DRY STACKED TAILINGS ” IS SHORT-SIGHTED AT BEST . THE GROUND SURFACE ON WHICH THE TAILINGS ARE TO BE STACKED MUST BE LEVELED IN SUCH A WAY THAT ALL SEEPAGE IS CONTAINED AND NOT ALLOWED TO ACCESS EXISTING DRAINAGE PATTERNS .
IT APPEARS MORE AND MORE THAT POLITICAL INFLUENCE IN HIGH PLACES IS DECIDING ARIZONA’S COPPER MINING INDUSTRY . WHILE TECHNICAL ISSUES DICTATE RULES AND REGULATIONS , POLITICS HAS NO RULES AND REGULATIONS . A VOTE IN THE HAND IS WORTH MORE THAN TWO IN THE BUSH . HUDBAY WILL MAKE EVERY EFFORT TO MINE THE ROSEMONT COPPER PROPERTY WHEN IT IS IN THEIR BEST INTERESTS TO DO SO .
THE TIME HAS COME TO RALLY THE OPPOSITION TO THE ROSEMONT COOPER PROJECT IN ORDER THAT IT TRANSLATES INTO VOTES . PERHAPS A SIT IN ON THE GROUNDS OF THE LEGISLATURE WOULD BE APPROPRIATE ?
Good Golly Allen Get Off On Rain Fall On The Desert 2014 .01 Inches!! Yikeess Maybe Beavers Could Make A Dam For You Tree Huggers?? Carry On With Rosemont Mines!! God Bless America.