ECONOMIC ASSESSMENT OF AMULSAR GOLD MINING PROJECT QUESTIONED
15:27 March 23, 2015
EcoLur
Specialists give professional assessment to Amulsar open pit mining
project implemented by Lydian International Company in Armenia with
the financial support of the European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development, EBRD, and International Finance Corporation, IFC.
This time it’s Harutyun Movsisyan, PhD in Geological Sciences,
Associate Professor, who submitted his assessment on the official
website of Aarhus Centers, , which particularly says:
“The EIA submitted by the company mentions heap leach facility with
a capacity of 106 million tons and says nothing that this volume is
wastes to be collected in the tailing dump, which needs technical
conditions, special project, hazard category and a passport. It
mentions only the area and nothing about fencing etc. The project
excludes penetration of hazardous substances (note by EcoLur: gold
extraction with cyanide) into environment and doesn’t plan to locate
recording detectors below the protecting layer. Only these devices
can fix any leak to take measures against.
The next problem is the seismic assessment of Amulsar project area.
The EIA mentions middle extent of seismic risks, while the section on
a heap leach facility doesn’t mention seismicity at all. A question
arises: how seismicity can be assessed, if the technical proposal
on facility construction is missing and compliance with technical
standards is missing. We speak about seismicity of 5-6 magnitude,
which is underestimated assessment for this region. Amulsar is located
in the seismic zone within the ranges of 0.2-0.3 g and higher, which
can be interpreted as 8-9 magnitude seismicity.
The project mentions about the wastes and barren rock, which will
be accumulated after open pit, but it forgets about the heap leach
facility located in a distance of 1.2 km from Gndevaz Village and
adsorption-desorption-recovery (ADR) plant. The sanitary zone is
calculated in a distance of 1.5 km from the nearest house, which is
incorrect. Sanitary zone is determined as 1 km from buffer zone, which
separates residential area from the zone of business activities. Under
the international standards, this distance is 2 km from the buffer
zone, so the plant must be relocated in a distance of 3 km from the
residential area.
Then what about rationality. Under the project, dead pits will be
filled with barren rock. But the data show that at the depth of 50-100
meters ores are available, while according to RA Code on Subsoil, the
development of the mine is permitted, if absence of further resources
is proved. Nevertheless, the project doesn’t mention anything about
expected resources of expansion, reclaiming plans and waste generation
and disposal limits project, i.e. expected resources and balance are
subject to state assessment.”