The B.C. government has approved Pretium’s $450-million Brucejack gold mine, the first mine approved since the collapse of the Mount Polley mine tailings dam last year. Construction of the mine, about 275 kilometres northwest of Smithers, is expected to begin this summer and it is to be in commercial production by 2017. The project will create 500 jobs during the two-year construction period and 300 permanent jobs during its 16-year life.
The Ministry of Energy and Mines said the mine, unlike Imperial Metal’s Mount Polley gold and copper mine, will not have a facility to store mine waste held back with an earth-and-rock dam. The failure of the Mount Polley earth dam last summer released millions of cubic metres of water and finely-ground rock containing potentially-toxic metals (called tailings) into the Quesnel watershed in the B.C. Interior.
Gordon Hoekstra – Vancouver Sun – March 30, 2015.
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