EcoLur
The expert of Canadian 'Clear Coast Consulting' Dr. André Sobolewski confirmed that there is acid and high risks of polluted water in Amulsar project, as well as there are risks that they will be let out into clean waters.
Sobolewski claimed that the mine closedown program is incomplete. Under him, the financial guarantees proposed by Lydian are too low, reclaiming expenses are not sufficient, and if the company fails the project, the expenses needed to close down the mine will remain on the Armenian people.
He estimated what kind of expenses will be needed to make to clean the area from mining pollutants. 'US $ 3-5 billion is needed to build the station cleaning acid drainage, while its operation will cost around US $ 0.6-0.9 million per year. Such cleaning actions should be implemented rom 200 to 500 years. If to estimate that water cleaning will take around 200 years, the total expenses for cleaning acid drainage will make up US $125-180 million. All this is required only to clean acid drainage and several pollutants. The HLF will have thiocyanate, which also requires cleaning. Only the construction of a station for cleaning thiocyanate will require US $ 1.5 million for the beginning and US $ 0.4 million per year, which will make up around US $ 10 million for 10 years. They haven't included all this in the range of final closedown activities. Lydian is proposing to allot US $ 34 million for the closedown of the mine, while I have estimated that US $ 15 million will be required for reclaiming and recovery, US $ 140 million for the limestone cleaning station and US $ 10 million for the construction and the operation of the station to clean thiocyanate. A minimum of US $165 million will be required to reclaim the area after the closedown of the mine. If the company fails, the Armenian Government won't have us $ 165 million, but will have only US $ 34 million, which will be borne by the Armenian people The financial guaranteed provided by Lydian are too low and should be re-assessed,' Sobolewski said.
June 21, 2018 at 19:09