Mount Polley Mine hopes to resume full-time operations in April or May of this year with plans to use the tailings storage facility that breached in August 2014, said Luke Moger, the mine’s project engineer.
During the mine’s community meeting held in Williams Lake Wednesday that attracted about 20 people, Moger said the company’s permit application to return to full operations is being reviewed by the Ministries of Mines and Environment.
By April it is expected the mine will have used up its processed ore limit of 4,000,000 tonnes, stipulated in its present temporary permit, he said.
“Any other option for tailings storage would require additional disturbance in another area that would require reclamation at closure,” Moger explained, noting to prevent another breach, the TSF’s embankment is being buttressed, the slope’s steepness decreased and no more than one million cubic metres of water will be stored inside it at one time.
On Dec. 1, 2015 the company began discharging treated water from the site, sending it down the seven-kilometre length of Hazeltine Creek and through a pipe into Quesnel Lake.
Jerry Vandenberg of Golder Associates said the company also plans to submit an alternative water discharge design and implementation plan by the end of January.
Meanwhile water sampling reports are being posted regularly on Imperial Metals’ website and continue to meet water quality guidelines, Vandenberg said.
