Source document: https://docs-lawep.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/1697643861273.pdf (Australia)
Attention: Environment and Communications References Committee Re: Inquiry into the rehabilitation of mining and resources projects as it relates to Commonwealth responsibilities ECNT welcome the opportunity to explore issues around rehabilitation of resource projects.

This inquiry comes at a time when our organisation is doing a bit of work in this space, and so recent relevant articles are attached.
As recently as 2013, the NT Government established a Legacy Mines Program within the Department of Primary Industry and Resources, funded by a 1% annual levy on rehabilitation bonds.

This program estimates the liability of legacy mines in the NT at $1billion, and appropriately prioritises Rum Jungle, Mt Todd and Redbank.

In recent years, the Territory’s emergent iron ore projects have been abandoned, leaving behind unresolved and inadequately scoped remediation challenges.
The last few years have seen the expected rehabilitation time line of McArthur River Mine near Borroloola balloon from decades to centuries, with no clarity on the miner’s assurity for that unbounded responsibility.

Despite some movement on policy at a Territory level, we still see rehabilitation as a moving feast, with unresolved issues that could only benefit from greater federal oversight.
It is hoped that this brief summary offers a useful snapshot of the state of play, and scope for improved management to better guarantee agreed environmental objectives.

Security bonds The Northern Territory Government’s Department of Primary Industry and Resources are in the process of reviewing their security bond policy.

The securities paid by resource project operators are intended, in part, to stand as a contingency to cover all activities permitted by the project’s Mining Management Plan.
However in the past, both the MMP which describes those activities, and the bond itself, have been hidden from public scrutiny under the designation of Commercial Confidentiality.

ECNT have advocated strongly that public confidence in the regulatory environment is dependent upon this basic information.

There is a strong public interest case for full disclosure of all details of authorised activities, the related rehabilitation expectations, and our shared capacity to meet those expectations.
Rum Jungle uranium province This inquiry also comes in tandem with a significant milestone in the protracted saga of the legacy Rum Jungle uranium province.

We often refer to Rum Jungle as the worst-case example of uranium mining in Australia, but the post-mining activities illustrate a similar standard regarding rehabilitation.
Tel: (08) 8981 1984 | Fax: (08) 8941 0387 | admin@ecnt.org | http://www.ecnt.org/ Postal: GPO Box 2120, Darwin NT 0801 | Office: Unit 3/98 Woods Street, Darwin Northern Territory - Australia Rehabilitation of mining and resources projects as it relates to Commonwealth responsibilitiesSubmission 21 Management of radioactive waste at Rum Jungle has been a problem since uranium mining began in 1954.

Contaminated water collected on site during the Dry, only to wash into the river each Wet.
Tailings were allowed to wash into the east branch of the Finniss River each wet season for nearly 30 years, in addition to one particular spectacular unintentional release that had a When the mine was eventually abandoned in 1971, no significant rehabilitation followed.

The Commonwealth and NT governments spent years arguing over the scope of works and demarcation of responsibility.

It wasn’t until 1983 that the Commonwealth finally addressed a limited set of the major contamination issues.
Then in 1991, further work was undertaken to reduce pollution at Rum Jungle Creek South.

But despite these poorly funded, feeble attempts at cleaning up, contamination sources have yet to be adequately contained.

Monitoring in 1998 showed that the Finniss River still bears the impacts of the abandoned pits.
The NT Department’s 2002 monitoring report identified deterioration of the tailings piles - hills of mining waste which continue to leach acidic water into the river, including uranium, other radioactive materials and heavy metals.

Prospects for rehabilitation picked up when the Federal Government budgeted in 2009 for a four-year monitoring program, which has gone on to develop into an inter-governmental rehabilitation project.
An environmental impact assessment process examining the Rum Jungle Rehabilitation Project is currently progressing.

After a regrettable period of buck-passing between governments, and a few half-hearted false starts last century, ECNT enthusiastically welcome the Rum Jungle rehabilitation project as the best chance yet to get a grip on the pollution issues around the old uranium pits.
Mt Todd gold mine The original Mt Todd project was conceived by Pegasus Gold in the mid 80s, and commenced operations in 1993.

A combination of depressed market and technical difficulties saw the project abandoned in under four years.

The operator walked away in 1997, forfeiting a $900,000 bond which proved vastly inadequate to guarantee timely rehabilitation, which administrators have since estimated to require $20 million.
Faced with this significant cost burden, the NT Government decided to buy time, cycling contaminated water on site while waiting for market conditions to enable a new operator to exploit the scenario.

This appeared to bear fruit when a joint venture, led by General Gold, took over in 1999, but this arrangement too fell apart just a year later.

Government spent a few million dollars of public funds to maintain a holding pattern, continuing after Vista Gold took over the lease in 2006.
It did seem that appropriate management actions were delayed, pending the eventual authorisation for expansion of mining activities.

This allowed abandoned cyanide solution and other legacy contaminants to be lost in a major flooding event, at considerable risk to the surrounding environment.

ECNT agree that it is preferable that mining companies complete rehabilitation.

Rehabilitation bonds are an essential safety net for when all else fails.
Tel: (08) 8981 1984 | Fax: (08) 8941 0387 | admin@ecnt.org | http://www.ecnt.org/ Postal: GPO Box 2120, Darwin NT 0801 | Office: Unit 3/98 Woods Street, Darwin Northern Territory - Australia Rehabilitation of mining and resources projects as it relates to Commonwealth responsibilitiesSubmission 21 But that in no way should imply endorsement for the flawed logic of pursuing a new miner to take on a failed project’s management burden.
This misguided strategy of looking for a new miner to solve the old one’s problems has been entertained just as unsuccessfully elsewhere in the NT this century - delaying appropriate management action at Redbank, and perverting decision making regarding the brief foray of junior miner Compass Resources at Rum Jungle.

ECNT firmly advocate that this strategy should be explicitly rejected as a proven failure.
Redbank copper mine Redbank stands as perhaps the most heavily polluted of the Territory’s abandoned legacy mines, with a security bond of little more than $150,000 to go towards rehabilitation estimated to cost hundreds of times that amount.

Abandoned in 1996, for over ten years heavily contaminated run off leached into the nearby Hanrahan’s Creek while government waited for another operator to take on responsibility for the site.
Since then, we’ve had another ten years, while the junior miner who has stepped into that role tries to drum up investment.

That’s 20 years of significant unmanaged pollution, from this flawed strategy of getting a new miner to take on an old project’s legacy.

Frances Creek iron ore mine The Territory has seen a number of iron ore projects shut down or enter administration in the face of depressed market in recent years.
When Territory Iron’s Frances Creek mine shut in 2014, rehabilitation costs had been estimated at up to $30 million, compared to the $5.4 million security, set only one year previously.

This sudden difference has been described as resulting from failure to prosecute unauthorised mismanagement of waste on site.

When the Department tried to revise the bond up to $18.45 million post closure, the company challenged the decision in the Supreme Court.
This experience illustrates how the public can be left with significant unexpected cost, whether or not an appropriate security has been set, if the NT regulator is inappropriately tolerant of unauthorised actions and mismanagement.

McArthur River lead / zinc mine The McArthur River Mine, currently operated by Glencore, has been a concern of the ECNT since our inception over 30 years ago.
Community based campaigns opposing diversion of the river and staged expansion of the mine have failed to avert what has gone from being a mismanaged mine to an unmanageable pollution source.

In the face of compounding environmental management challenges, the operator has been subject to legal action by Traditional Owners, represented by the Environment Defenders Office (EDONT) in the NT Civil and Administrative Appeals Tribunal, to disclose their rehabilitation bond.
Tel: (08) 8981 1984 | Fax: (08) 8941 0387 | admin@ecnt.org | http://www.ecnt.org/ Postal: GPO Box 2120, Darwin NT 0801 | Office: Unit 3/98 Woods Street, Darwin Northern Territory - Australia Rehabilitation of mining and resources projects as it relates to Commonwealth responsibilitiesSubmission 21 The Independent Monitor charged with preparing an annual report on the miner’s environmental performance last year described multiple breaches of their authorisation, including a smouldering toxic pile with over 30 exceedences of authorised sulphur emissions in a six month period.
The IM last year said it would be hard to imagine the site being rehabilitated this century, and the parent company was reported this month (‘Authorities oblivious to toxic mine breaches’, The Australian, 8/4/17) as admitting that “the site — once expected to be fully rehabilitated within a couple of decades — may now need managing for hundreds of years.” The last authorisation saw the NT Government allow Glencore to build tailings storage cells out of material which the Independent Monitor warned was not appropriate.
ECNT and others highlighted this warning through our participation in EIA.

It was a point of incredulity that the company simply disagreed about the characterisation of the material they erroneously proposed for construction.

Now, the same facility is a source for recurring breaches of their authorisation to operate, and yet the NT regulator has not prosecuted.
Given the experiences of Frances Creek, ECNT are concerned that the rehabilitation burden of this mismanagement may fall upon the public, given the clear failure of NT regulators to prosecute repeated breaches.

Ranger uranium mine Ranger presents the unique scenario of a contentious and contested uranium project within the bounds of an internationally listed World Heritage national park.
This project not only demands intense scrutiny, but also has challenging legislated requirements for rehabilitation of the lease to a standard fit for reincorporation into the surrounding Kakadu National Park.

This year, the project has well and truly refocused on rehabilitation.

All mining has ceased, leaving just a few more years of operation, processing existing stockpiles.
The Commonwealth requires the miner, Energy Resources of Australia (ERA), to ensure that tailings are physically isolated from the environment and present no impact for at least 10,000 years.

The rehabilitation phase of this, the longest running Australian uranium mine, is an unprecedented test of the adequacy of the Commonwealth’s mine rehabilitation capacity, and will necessarily set industry benchmarks.
But as recently as ERA’s 2014 annual report, the company suggested further expansion into underground mining would be necessary to guarantee adequate funds for rehabilitation.

The company’s claim clearly challenged the adequacy of the security calculated and required by the Commonwealth.
It is likely that sustained historically low uranium prices contributed to the decision by parent company (and majority shareholder) Rio Tinto to offer a credit facility to shore up ERA’s capacity to meet their rehabilitation funding commitments.

ECNT are interested to follow the progress of this inquiry, and welcome any opportunity to participate further in pursuit of improved environmental outcomes on Territory resource projects.
Tel: (08) 8981 1984 | Fax: (08) 8941 0387 | admin@ecnt.org | http://www.ecnt.org/ Postal: GPO Box 2120, Darwin NT 0801 | Office: Unit 3/98 Woods Street, Darwin Northern Territory - Australia Rehabilitation of mining and resources projects as it relates to Commonwealth responsibilitiesSubmission 21