Mining’s old guard needs strong medicine
A new report details subpar investor returns in the mining industry over the last decade, particularly big cap diversified companies which have not adapted to new realities.
Environmentalists and community members expressed concerns after the Mexican government announced that Candelaria Mining was allowed to continue exploration at its Caballo Blanco gold project, located 65 kilometers northwest of the city of Veracruz.
The district-scale project consists of 14 contiguous mining claims that cover 19,815 hectares. It sits close to Mexico’s only nuclear power plant.
Talking to the news outlet ElRegio.com, physicist Bernardo Salas Mar, who is also a former employee of the Laguna Verde nuclear plant, said that authorities acted in an irresponsible way when they approved Candelaria’s activities. “Nuclear plants must be built in areas with low population density and where no industrial, fishing, agricultural, or livestock activities take place. Allowing a miner to operate there is absurd. This might entangle the objectives of the External Radiological Emergency Plan,” he said (in Spanish).
Since Caballo Blanco is an advanced-stage open-pit, heap leach gold mine, Salas Mar said that once explosions start to take place, the nearby nuclear reactors are likely to fail. “That’s the reason why the Secretary of Hydraulic Resources refused to allow the building of a dam in Laguna Verde’s mountains,” he added.
At the moment, Candelaria has mobilized a drill rig and initiated drilling on a 2,000-meter program of infill drilling at the northern La Paila zone. Seven holes are planned in this area which will seek to confirm the resource model and provide tighter drill spacing in some areas of the resource.
5 Comments
TimS
Environmentalists should also express concerns about other type of mining activity.
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Mr Potatohead
This is ridiculous. Unmitigated, blatant alarmism.
Typical of rampant environmentalists with no accountability…
Kenneth Viney
Controlled explosions are going on weekly at the OROVILLE DAM SPILLWAY REPAIR less than 1 K from this 700 ft. earth filled dam and no body is upset and no damage will result if delayed charges are used as has been the practice. Ignorant shrill folk are more of a danger than the blasting contractor.
Arctic_Fox
Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anything! (BANANA). BANANAs gotta BANANA. Candeleria’s proposed mine is 5 miles and more from the nuke plant. Surface blasting, at that distance, will lead to vibrations less than a heavy truck rolling up to the front gate. If the nuke plant is somehow “likely to fail” due to that level of vibration, then someone had better speak to the architects about their seismic preparations.
TheSkyIsNotFallingItWasABird
Arctic Fox…I hate to jump on this but the site is 4 kms from the reactor.
But your points are still valid. It is far enough away that any shaking that could cause a problem should be considered more critically as a reflection on quality of the installation.
The general public envisions a blast at a mine as a sudden shock whereas in reality in an open pit, the blast is controlled by relays that create a “rolling” effect across many rows of blast holes. It’s more akin to thunder than a BLAST. I’d bet 1000 pesos that some thunder storms in the area create more shaking at the reactor than a production blast at the mine 4 kms away could ever do. And it would do it without the potential for 1 billion joules of electricity lighting up it’s roof.