Changing Perceptions of Extractive Industry in New Zealand

Martha Mine, Waihi Gold's open pit operation.

Today we got a first hand look at the inner workings of extractive industries in New Zealand, in particular the gold and silver mining operation of the Waihi Mine and the restoration of the Tui Mine, NZ's most contaminated site. The Waihi Mine operations consists of the Martha Mine, a 260 meter deep, 640 meter wide and 860 meter long open pit (853 feet deep, 2100 feet wide, and 2820 feet long) - basically an enormous hole in the ground, and two underground mines. Currently no gold is being acquired from the open pit, but exploration efforts are underway to see if it is feasible to mine for gold underneath the open pit. The company is essentially trying to find more gold and silver to continue operations for years to come since it has been such an integral part of the town's economy for so many years. The Martha Mine was mined underground from 1882-1952 and today's open pit operations mostly consists of mining what was considered waste rock in the early mining years.

What was most interesting was learning about how Waihi Gold is dealing with historic perceptions of mining. As I stood along the fences surrounding the open pit, I was astonished that human machinery could create such a deep scar in the earth. It was incredible and scary. However, all the while I was there, I kept thinking back on my research on oil sands companies from my summer internship. I remembered reconciling my strong convictions of environmentally degrading practices by sustainable investors engaging in dialogue with companies to better their operations and encouraging best practice performance for a cleaner, more sustainable future. While many environmentalists, myself included, would love to do away with practices such as drilling for oil and mining for oil, precious metals, coal, you name it, these practices are most especially the ones that need to be focused on and assessed instead of dismissing them on the basis of their environmental damage. The same goes for precious metal mining, there are certain expectations that mining companies must meet due to a history of negative perceptions of the industry and as a result industry performance has undoubtedly improved over time.

Excavator used in mining operations of Waihi Gold. Quite the expensive piece of machinery with a single tire costing $20K.

A stark contrast from the socially responsible and environmentally conscious operation of the Waihi Mine is the Tui Mine. It was in production from 1967-1973 and mined metals including zinc, copper, lead and some silver. It was owned by a Japanese company that was liquidated in 1973 and the mine shut down in 1975. Tui closed so abruptly and without warning that mine workers showed up to find no one there. Today, remediation efforts have been ongoing and are being undertaken by Environment Waikato. The Tui Mine site currently consists of a technically unstable dam that sits above the underground mine. The toxic tailings ponds lie behind the dam. It is estimated that 40,000 tons of toxins reside in the tailings and stabilization processes are being used for their recovery. The process of stabilization consists of pumping cement and lime with the tailings in order to change their chemical composition and stabilize it. The fear surrounding this effort is the very imminent threat of dam collapse in an earthquake or washout event. Since the catchment generates a lot of water and annual rainfall totals 2 meters, dam collapse and contamination of Te Aroha, the town below is a real danger.

Tui Mine tailings pond. Grey bits on the side are the toxic tailings.

On the upside, the Tui Mine does provide operating mines such as Waihi with a classic example of what not to do as a mine operation. In conjunction with New Zealand's Resource Management Act, an incident such as Tui would never be allowed to happen again as it establishes a resource consent system. This system requires operators to plan for mine closure before the mine is even up and running. It also requires that they obtain consents from the government in order to mine and carry out different aspects of the operation such as discharging water and establishing water quality monitoring, preventing any hazardous effluent from getting into streams and rivers.

All the pressure put on mining companies by legislation and the scrutiny that they face by the public has aided in their continued improvement as well as an added expansion of environmental efforts. The Waihi Mine, for instance, funds and supports efforts to protect the dotterel in Opoutere. As one of our guest speakers put it: it is developed nations with democratic institutions, a free press and environmental regulations such as New Zealand that should be taking responsibility for having and bettering these industries rather than putting the burden on developing countries that have rampant corruption and political strife.