Published on April 11, 2019.

To avoid damage to the environment and surrounding communities, mining companies must have rigorous mine closure programs, which is regulated by Law No. 20,551.

On April 3, in the Sala of the Senate, a bill was approved to modify this law, with the aim of that large and medium-sized mining guarantee the measures they will take to leave insured their operations once they reach their useful life, avoiding that abandoned liabilities or residues that can become highly pollutants. These modifications are mainly aimed at facilitate the constitution of guarantees and reduce bureaucracy in the update of plans for closure of sites.

Mining Minister Baldo Prokuriça has indicated that, with this initiative, progress will be made on two issues fundamental. “First, reactivate those projects that, having the approved environmental impact studies, they do not have the resources to run them. And, on the other hand, many initiatives that today are guaranteed the closure of sites through guarantee tickets can free up those resources that today they reach more than US $ 3,300 million and are reinvested in the sector ”. 

The initiative was approved unanimously and now it will soon go to its last legislative process to become law.

Agreement between the Government and private

Within the framework of the Policy National Tailings, meanwhile, the ministries of Mining and the Environment together the Environmental Assessment Service (SEA) signed, on March 27, an agreement to facilitate that private companies, as a compensation measure for their upcoming projects, reprocess and remediate abandoned tailings.

This will translate into which deposits abandoned miners are transferred or closed by private companies, through the environmental compensation tool present in the Law N ° 19,300 and the Regulation of the Environmental Impact Assessment System.

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Sources: www.portalminero.com/proyecto