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A B.C. coal mining company in northeastern B.C. has been fined more than $45,000 for repeated violations of the province’s environmental protection rules, including the failure to monitor mine waste into fish-bearing water and failure to limit particulate being put into the air.
Conuma Resources Limited is a metallurgical coal mining company operating in the Tumbler Ridge area in northeastern B.C., roughly 660 kilometres directly northeast of Vancouver.
It mines coal from to produce carbon used in steelmaking at three different sites in the region, employing approximately 900 people.
In documents posted online, the B.C. Ministry of Environment and Climate Change argued the company repeatedly and knowingly failed to comply with environmental regulations, limiting the amount of particulate put into the air by mining operations, and failed to monitor waste water put into local waterways on more than 400 separate occasions.
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$45k isn’t a fine. It’s the cost of doing business.
A fine would be $4.5 billion for 400 wastewater dumps.
As I say elsewhere, this is probably just the starting point. Right now they are being fined for not monitoring and as a result are being made to see if there was an impact on water and fish. If those results come back as showing a negative impact on these receptors, the big fines will follow.
Did you see that a Sunshine Coast homeowner fined $70,000 for dredging creek?
I wonder if $45,000 even covers the cost of 1 or 2 of those clean ups?
Nope. And it’s less than the cost of actually doing what they are supposed to be doing. This is like driving into a crowd and being given a speeding ticket. Absolutely fucking shameful. But I bet the government officials overseeing the case probably got a nice vacation out of it.
They are being very lenient here, but these fines are probably the first of many. They may well lose their permit to operate, as it is within the Director’s right to do so.
The 406 instances of not monitoring effluent sounds like they shut down their water monitoring program periodically (winter?). Not controlling mine effluent is a big no-no. A major mine company got fined 60 million for selenium issues. Also, you risk getting DFO involved, since their purview covers all fish-bearing water, and bad things happen pretty quickly once the feds are involved.
It will be interesting to see what happens. Cool article.
When does the government step in, shut down the company, and sell the assets to another firm?
Clearly, this company is irresponsible and cannot follow the law. You don’t have to shut down the operation and have people lose their jobs, but don’t let the company keep operating
Fine those polluters!
Be a shame if someone contaminated their water and food in return
There’s a Brit Marling movie where exactly that kind of thing happens to some corporate execs. (I think it was a chemical company instead of mining though.)
The title is…
spoiler
The East
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Conuma Resources Limited is a metallurgical coal mining company operating in the Tumbler Ridge area in northeastern B.C., roughly 660 kilometres directly northeast of Vancouver.
Ministry of Environment and Climate Change argued the company repeatedly and knowingly failed to comply with environmental regulations, limiting the amount of particulate put into the air by mining operations, and failed to monitor waste water put into local waterways on more than 400 separate occasions.
On the issue of particulate, a report from the ministry says Conuma has failed to properly set up its operations to prevent excessive amounts of dust and discharge from entering the surrounding air, exceeding provincial limits on dozens of occasions over multiple years.
However, the company argued that wildfires in the region, as well as slash-burning from nearby forestry operations, were also contributing factors and it should not be held solely responsible.
Environmental Management Act director Jason Bourgeois agreed, and removed some of violations from the final ruling.
As a result, it is supposed to sample toxin levels from its operations, have them be tested for compliance and regularly share that information with provincial officials.
The original article contains 579 words, the summary contains 179 words. Saved 69%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
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