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Protests against Europe’s would-be largest gold mine hit their fifth straight week on Sunday, showing that opponents are nowhere near losing force.
Thousands of people gathered in London and Bucharest on Sunday in a show of opposition against mine plans.
Protesters are battling Canadian company Gabriel Resources (TSX:GBU) over its proposed Rosia Montana gold mine project in Transylvania. Romanians are concerned over the firm’s plans to use cyanide and other environmental impacts of mining.
Earlier this month the Romanian government established a commission to produce a report by October 20th. The Parliament will then vote in November. The President has also proposed holding a referendum.
Fox News reports that 4,000 people marched in Bucharest.
Meanwhile, hundreds also gathered in London’s Trafalgar Square, the Independent Reports.
Gabriel Resources has responded to the government’s hesitancy by threatening to sue for $4 billion.
7 Comments
allritejack
Some education is needed. Cyanide degrades quickly in the environment.
Paul Popa
This is the reason why Romanian people are afraid of cyanide!!!!!
Dam failure
On the night of January 30, 2000, a dam holding contaminated waters
burst and 100,000 cubic metres of cyanide-contaminated water (containing
an estimated 100 tonnes of cyanides[3]) spilled over some farmland and then into the Someș river.[1][2]
Esmeralda Exploration blamed excessive snowfall for the dam failure.[1]
Effects
After the spill, the Someș had cyanide concentrations of over 700
times the permitted levels. The Someș flows into the Tisza, Hungary’s
second largest river, which then flows into the Danube. The spill
contaminated the drinking supplies of over 2.5 million Hungarians.[1] In addition to cyanide, heavy metals were also washed into the river and they have a long-lasting negative impact on the environment.[1]
Wildlife was particularly affected on the Tisza: on a stretch,
virtually all living things were killed, and further south, in the
Serbian section, 80% of the aquatic life was killed.[1]
Large quantities of fish died due to the toxicity of cyanide in the
waters of the rivers, affecting 62 species of fish, of which 20 are
protected species. In Hungary, volunteers participated in removing the
dead fish to prevent the disaster from spreading across the food chain,
as other animals, such as foxes, otters and ospreys have died after eating contaminated fish.[1]
After the cyanide entered the Danube, the large volume of the river’s water diluted the cyanide,[1] but in some sections it still remained as high as 20 to 50 times the allowed concentration.[4]
Two years after the spill, the ecosystem began to recover, but it was
still far from its initial state, as the fishermen of Hungary claim
that their catches in 2002 were only at a fifth of their original
levels.[3]
Subsequent spills
Five weeks later, a spill of contaminated waters (this time with heavy metals) hit the region.[3] A dyke burst in Baia Borşa, Maramureş County and 20,000 cubic metres of zinc, lead and copper-contaminated water made its way into the Tisza.[5]
A year later, another cyanide spill occurred in Romania, this time being a deliberate emptying of cyanide solutions into the Siret River
Ale
It is not only the cyanide the Romanians are worried about. At Rosia Montana there are other mineral resources which can be exploited.
Sergo Cusiani
Cyanide vapors degrade in 5 mm distance from the evaporation surface as a result of ultra violet radiation of the Sun. But not all the cyanide, evaporation takes time. Otherwise there would be no sense in leaching ore as it is being done by spraying the solution over the mineralized rock. Solution washes ore and its take off is then contained and treated. If the cyanide solution leaks into the ground there may be no chance for the Sun to degrade vapors. Cyanide solution leaks may lead to concentration of cyanide in the soil, contaminating ground waters. This is dangerous.
Friendly view
This is a big loss for Romania. I appreciate it is mainly a political game; however in a long term (10 or 20 years?) this mine will go ahead and it is not good that
this could not be resolved now.
Technically there is nothing wrong with the technology, it is a commonly used technology all around the world and in developed countries such as Australia, Canada, USA etc. The issue with Romania is lack of knowledge and practical experience and therefore it makes it so easy to create a fear and raise the opposition to the Project.
As for the environment, whoever was in Rosia could see that the damage from old mining works is already significant, acidic streams are leaching from old Roman works and water streams are brown and heavily polluted. Lots of money is required to eliminate it . Only a major new project would be able to fix it (Otherwise why are the protesters or government not fixing it now?).
Again I do not want to make assumptions about political issues, corruption and similar…..I have no first hand knowledge of it.
However, technically there is absolutely nothing wrong with CIL/CIP
technology and no cyanide would be discharged from the plant if only
operators are properly trained (as it is the case in hundreds of similar
facilities around the world).
Another note: someone in above comments has mixed up the tank leaching with heap leaching (spraying over heaps of rock), which is not proposed for Rosia Montana.
Otherwise it is so sad to see the surrounding townships around the region… it looks as nothing’s been invested in this part of the country for at least 40 years(!) and that joining EU has not brought any benefit to these people.Most of te industrial buildings are in decomposing state and there is no new construction and development happening. How are they going to survive? Not all of them can move to big cities or Western Europe?
Larisa
So you would rather have a booming economy than good health? :)) Damn people, you need to rethink your priorities. No wonder the rate of cancer is so high in the West. Mining is not good for people’s health but yes it is good for economy if it’s done safely; else economy will have to compensate for the negative side of mining. Cyanide can infiltrate into the soil, contaminate water. The soil isn’t made of titanium ok? And that dam won’t be any good (who’s gonna pay for it FOREVER?). I think the outcome is just not worth it. Plus we live in Romania, even if we extract ourselves all that gold, most money won’t be invested in the country but fill the Swiss bank accounts of our corrupt government. People do want to work hard for a better society but when those who lead this country don’t even respect the laws, what chance do we have? Another revolution?
Sants
While I fully understand the concern about using cyanide in the extraction process, what is being missed here is that the operation is a milling circuit. In short, the leaching of the gold is done in leach tanks (a closed circuit), not on a big, heap leach operation, where cyanide is just sprayed onto the crushed ore, in an open environment. The tailings dam, which holds water used in the treatment of the ore, would be treated, prior to release to the dam, neutralizing the cyanide to acceptable environmental levels. And, kept in the tailings pond, not released into the nearby streams and rivers.
And, it is truly disgusting what happened in 2000 at Baia Mare, however, how many cyanide spills, of note, have occurred since? The disaster spurred governments and environmental groups to tighten standards on cyanide use and containment and improving technologies. And let’s not forget, the number of mines, in operation globally, that have had no, or few environmental issues. We don’t seem to hear about those, do we? Major companies are bound by global standards, hence why the cost of producing has skyrocketed. Most of the environmental issues that we see today are a result of local, small scale, illegal miners, that operate with no guidelines, dumping mercury and untreated tailings into rivers and streams.
So the issue now, knowing there is gold at Rosia Montana, is who will mine it? You let a public company operate the mine, who will abide by global standards on the environment and share both revenues directly (through very high revenue royalties) and profits (thru taxation), as well as a direct stake in the mine, with the government of Romania. Which will go towards improving infrastructure, paying for hospitals and schools, thereby improving health and education in Romania. Not to mention, the thousands of people that will be employed by the mine. The trickle effect, as a result of the additional incomes, would help all industries, as local demand would pick-up as a result. Or, let illegal miners come take over the hills, once Gabriel is gone, spilling untreated mercury and cyanide into the streams and rivers, while not paying any taxes and only enriching themselves, and leaving the area in disarray once they’re done.
I totally understand the fear of another disaster occurring, It is a risk everywhere, in every industry. But, let’s face it, if the world were to stop flying because of one plane crash, or the world were to stop using nuclear power because of a reactor meltdown, where would we be? As unfortunate as catastrophes are, they are not the be all and end all. They force governments and industries to tighten standards and improve processes so that the accidents don’t happen again, while at the same time, moving forward with progress.
For the record, I don’t have a personal stake in Rosia Montana or Gabriel, so whether it is built or not doesn’t affect me. However, I do follow the mining industry fairly closely, and I’m somewhat concerned about the amount of misinformation that is put forth on a number of projects. Someone should look into the NGOs that promote the campaigns against mines, and find out why they do it, and where the money comes from. I bet digging deeper, you might find that the money may not the cleanest, but the NGOs aren’t concerned about that, and continue to allow themselves to funded by such organizations.