The Manitoba government said April 19 that it has committed $50.7 million over the next five years for the remediation of high-priority orphaned and abandoned mines, most of which are in the province’s north.
The five priority sites include Ruttan Mine east of Leaf Rapids, the Sherridon Mine in Sherridon, the Lynn Lake Mine, which is also known as the Farley Mine, and the Gods Lake Mine, as well as the Central Mine in Bissett.
The construction phase of remediation was recently completed in Sherridon, and the site will now move into long-term care and maintenance mode, Environment Minister Jeff Wharton said at an April 19 press conference. Over 1.3 million cubic meters of clay has been placed on the tailings management area at Ruttan Mine to prevent windblown tailings and to reduce the volume of acidic water that the site generates. In an update on the Ruttan remediation last spring, the province said that the project also involves directing all contaminated water at the site of the mine, which operated for 30 years until closing in 2002, into an open pit where it will be treated before being discharged into the environment. It is estimated that 5.5 million cubic metres of water at the site will need to be treated every year for five years to complete that work.
“Water is so important not only to Manitobans but for all of use around the world,” said Wharton, noting that remediating old mines is going to be a long-term process.
Manitoba has 153 orphaned or abandoned mines, which are no longer in operation and have owners that either can’t be found or are financially unable to complete remediation work, in which case the responsibility passes over to the province.
“We know that these mines have been around for decades if not generations so certainly that’s why the focus is on investing this money quickly to move forward because they’ve been ignored and with that many open abandoned mines out there we recognize that we need to move quickly and that’s exactly what we’re going to do,” Wharton told the Thompson Citizen.
Remediation work can include capping of shafts, debris cleanup, sealing mine openings and covering tailings. To date, remediation work has been completed at 39 high- and moderate-risk sites, which are now assessed as low risk and in need of only periodic monitoring under a new long-term care, maintenance and surveillance program.
“Without action many of these sites pose a real and potential threat to the environment and human safety and our health,” said Wharton.
Contracts to perform remediation work are publicly tendered.
“Our focus is to ensure that we create jobs in the north, and that’s exactly what we’re going to do with this process … move forward with communities in the north to ensure that jobs are created and there’s an economic spinoff for folks in the north as well,” said the minister.
