Hot on the heels of similar events held in Dunedin and Wānaka recently, an urgent public meeting has been organised in Cromwell for next week. Organisers have confirmed that given the strong local interest in the mine, particularly given the location of the mine at Bendigo, near the head of Lake Dunstan, they are expecting a good turnout.
The Cromwell meeting, to be held on the evening of Tuesday 26th August, will include a panel of expert speakers to lay out the known facts about the fast-tracked mine, take audience questions and discuss what the community can do. The panelist line up is being announced this week.
Suze Keith, chair of Sustainable Tarras Inc., says that there is a broad spectrum of issues people are very concerned about. “Despite the scant amounts of information released by the mining company so far, there are numerous very worrying issues” she said. “These include the size and scale of the mine right in the heart of an Outstanding Natural Landscape, the massive tailings dam which will hold 10,000 olympic swimming pools of toxic waste, and the extensive use and storage of large quantities of cyanide solution just upstream of the Clutha Mata Au River. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.”
Santana Minerals, an Australian company, is preparing its full fast-track application to file “imminently”, and aims to “strip the landcover by 2026.” Despite numerous requests for details and meetings, Santana is not being open and transparent with concerned Otago residents. “They’re not providing us information we’re reasonably asking for, and which we know they have got.”
She said that the small team of volunteers at Sustainable Tarras had spent “many hundreds of hours” searching through public records, stock exchange announcements, preparing and sending Official Information Act requests, meeting with council representatives and reviewing mining industry activities and standards, to develop a clear picture of the likely impact of the Australian company’s mine project.
“While Santana is happy to send out press releases to the Australian investment community celebrating the ‘excellent’ community engagement programmes and making broad statements about prosperity in the district, information flow and engagement with the mine’s neighbours – the people of Bendigo and Tarras – is very poor indeed.”
“Against the backdrop of the focus Santana is giving around how much gold there is buried in the ground, it is frustrating that they are not putting any priority at all on transparency around environmental and social impacts. Local communities are extremely worried, and more so as we uncover further information about the project.”
She said that local communities are just coming to grips with the scale of the mine. “Even the cyanide-leaching processing plant will be 130m wide and a kilometer long. The mine will involve an estimated 200 million tonnes of waste rock and 13 million tons of toxic tailings. These numbers, and the likely impacts and risks, are mind-boggling.”
The mine is also getting attention from people who are concerned that the fast-track process is being used inappropriately for a project which is not about public infrastructure or community benefit, but rather is solely about extraction of resources and maximising shareholder profits, most of which will go offshore. This mine would become the largest single earthworks in Otago since the Clyde Dam could be approved without the general public having any right of input into the proposal.
The Cromwell meeting follows meetings held in Dunedin and Wānaka over the last few weeks, with the Wānaka meeting attracting over 200 people. The meeting is organised by Sustainable Tarras, with support from Forest & Bird as well as the Central Otago Environmental Society and other groups.
The meeting is free to attend, but places are limited. People interested in attending the meeting in Cromwell next week should click this link, or type in the following URL: bit.ly/meetcromwell
