Newmont Gold Mine Investigated for Polluting Indonesian Waters

JAKARTA, Indonesia, August 17, 2004 (ENS) - Newmont Indonesia, a subsidiary of the world's largest gold producer, Denver-based Newmont Mining Corporation, is in trouble with Indonesian authorities over underwater disposal of mine tailings in Buyat Bay on the island of North Sulawesi.

Police are moving to question top executives at Newmont Indonesia after tests of water and sediment at the police forensic laboratory confirmed scientific studies showing heavy metal pollution from ocean dumping of waste from the Newmont Minahasa Raya gold mine, which is now closed.

"Indonesia has been gripped by news of an epidemic of health problems ranging from skin ailments, lumps and nervous system complaints suffered by dozens of Buyat Bay residents," conservation groups Friends of the Earth International, WALHI and the Mineral Policy Institute said on Saturday.

Minahasa mine with Buyat Bay in the distance. These engineers are planning the mine's closure. (Photo courtesy Newmont Mining Corporation)

The first people to be questioned will be Newmont Indonesia's director and staff, who are expected to provide details of the company's disposal system, National Police environmental expert and pollution investigator Commander Sulistyo Indriatmoko told the "Jakarta Post" on Sunday.

"They will have to explain what kind of chemicals they use in the mining process, and what chemicals they dispose of to the bay. We shall then compare their answers with our laboratory test results," Sulistyo said.

He said all samples tested had metal content higher than the 0.001 milligram/liter sea water pollution standard for mercury, cadmium and copper set by the Office of the State Minister of the Environment.

Next, police intend to test samples of blood, hair and the nails of Buyat residents, 22 of whom have travelled to Jakarta for the tests.

Police could halt operations at Minahasa and charge the company with violating Indonesian environmental law.

Minahasa is an open pit gold mine located 80 kilometers (50 miles) south of the city of Manado in the province of North Sulawesi. Mining ceased in October 2001, the company says, due to the depletion of the gold deposit and the mine is now in a phase of closure.

Still, mineral processing from stockpiles continued throughout 2003. A total 718,825 metric tons of tailings were deposited in Buyat Bay in 2002, the company states.

The company says its tailings are safe. In a 2002 document on the Newmont website, "Minhasa Now and Beyond 2002," the company explains that Minahasa disposes of its tailings - the finely crushed rock that remains after the gold has been removed - using submarine tailings placement (STP).

"The tailings - containing traces of arsenic and mercury (at levels below permit limits) which occur naturally within the ore - are placed in Buyat Bay, more than 80 metres below the sea surface, 1 km offshore," Newmont says.

Map of Southeast Asia showing Newmont Indonesia's Minahasa gold mine (Map courtesy Newmont)

Buyat Beach residents complain of decreasing fish catches since the tailings have been dumped into the bay, but the company says it has taught the fishermen better methods than the destructive dynamite fishing they used before the mine came to the bay.

But a map of Fishing Grounds of Buyat Fishermen produced through community mapping activities shows that since Newmont Indonesia started disposing of tailings in Buyat Bay, the fishermen have lost their traditional fishing grounds as a means of livelihood for their families.

Longgena Ginting, director of WALHI-Friends of the Earth Indonesia said,"The Buyat Bay pollution disaster shows that instead of benefiting poor communities, mining operations destroy livelihoods and health."

Ginting says the Buyat Bay pollution is an example of why the Extractive Industries Review of World Bank Group's lending practices headed by Indonesian environmental diplomat and statesman Dr. Emil Salim should have been taken more seriously by the International Finance Corporation (IFC).

The Extractive Industries Review, commissioned by the World Bank Group and issued in December 2003, has been endorsed by hundreds of indigenous groups, European parliamentarians and religious leaders around the world.

The Extractive Industries Review is critical of riverine and ocean disposal of mine waste, but this and other recommendations are ignored in the new IFC guidelines, the conservationists warn.

The draft IFC guidelines state that "deep marine tailings disposal may be considered as a preferred alternative" in certain circumstances, and the IFC also refuses to rule out riverine or shallow marine tailings disposal.

IFC guidelines are important not just because they guide the IFC’s lending operations, but because they are treated as a standard by other public and private financiers and export credit agencies.

"This is not a promising start," said Janneke Bruil of Friends of the Earth International. "IFC seems out of touch with reality. Reckless dumping of toxic waste in our rivers and seas is irresponsible, outdated, unacceptable and worlds away from its mission to alleviate poverty through sustainable development."

The Extractive Industries Review is online at: http://www.eireview.org/