A Texada Island mining company wants to assure islanders that water quality will not be affected by its mining operation.
Zyrox Mining Company has applied under the Environmental Management Act, seeking authorization for current effluent discharges from the Yew mine and Bolivar mill site near Van Anda. According to an environmental protection notice from the company, the source(s) of seasonal discharge are seepage from the Bolivar Mill tailings storage facility, seepage from the Yew north pit pond, and discharge from the lined Yew south pit pond.
The Yew mine is within the Van Anda watershed, downstream of the community water supply at the Priest Lake watershed, the environmental protection notice stated.
According to the environmental protection notice: “The estimated maximum discharge from Yew mine’s south pit pond is 470 cubic meters per day. The estimated average discharge from the south pit pond is 30 cubic metres per day. The discharge is seasonal, with higher discharge in winter and spring, and lower to no discharge in summer and fall. Seepage is more-or-less continuous but also varies seasonally.
“Lime is applied periodically to the north pit pond when the water quality deteriorates in the dry season. The treatment entails raising the pH and settling suspended solids to meet discharge limits. Subsequently, the effluent is released to ground from the lined south pit pond.
“Seepage from the historic tailings storage facility at the Bolivar mill is considered as a discharge. Groundwater and surface water monitoring will continue to be conducted to confirm the water quality downgradient of the Yew mine and Bolivar mill.”
Zyrox director Robert Papalia, in an interview with the Peak, said the Yew mine site has been explored since the 1970s and that there had been numerous geophysical, geochemical and drilling programs to identify the ore body at the site. A small bulk sample was collected in the early 2000s, according to Papalia.
“The site has not been reclaimed, but the micro-pits have recently been remediated and converted to water management ponds,” he added.
Ore samples would be extracted from the Yew mine and trucked to the Bolivar mill for processing, which is a little less than five kilometres away from Yew, said Papalia. The mill was commissioned in the 1970s and is being upgraded to process a 10,000-tonne bulk sample, he added. Zyrox is targeting about 40 per cent of the sample as a saleable product, including copper, iron and gold, according to Papalia.
He said permits for pre-existing discharge have lapsed and Zyrox is bringing the operation into compliance with current regulations. He said all the company’s data has been shared with provincial ministries of mining and critical minerals, and environment and climate change strategy. The mining company is now in consultation with the public and participated in a community meeting in Gillies Bay on April 14.
Project specialist Gerry Papini said the site is in the Emily Lake catchment, downstream of the Priest Lake catchment, which is Van Anda’s water source. He said the mine’s discharge is about 350 metres from Van Anda Creek and discharge from the micro-pits seeps to ground and flows via groundwater away from the mill site. During collection of the bulk mining sample, water from the pit will be conveyed to a settling pond and wetland and discharged to an unnamed tributary south of Emily Lake, according to Papini.
Papalia said there are residents concerned that the mine and mill will have an impact on Van Anda’s water supply. He said it is not happening, and there is lots of information to illustrate it is not occurring.
Papini said monitoring wells have been established and are being sampled, as well as groundwater levels. An independent contractor has been collecting surface and groundwater samples for three years, he added.
According to Papini, water from the pit ponds is not flowing toward Priest Lake.
“The results show that the groundwater standards for aquatic life are generally met within 50 metres of the discharge locations at both sites,” said Papini.
Papalia said Zyrox has applied to mine a 10,000-tonne bulk sample at the Yew, to process it at the Bolivar, and the project will take approximately six months.
“It’s important for us to note that extraction of that ore body is expected to improve the water quality because we are removing the mineralized source from the environment,” said Papalia.
Quality concerns
After Zyrox presented to the community meeting on Texada Island, meeting moderator Sandy McCormick, who is also the qathet Regional District (qRD) director for the island (Area D), said there has been concern about water quality among islanders.
“Priest Lake, Emily Lake, Turtle Pond and Van Anda Creek are all bodies of water that are connected,” said McCormick. “That is the water source for drinking water for Van Anda. The company maintains they are not causing any problems, but the community has been very concerned because there were no test results from the water testing being made public.
“[Zyrox] clarified a lot of information at the meeting, had slides and showed how they believe what they are doing is not causing problems. It’s actually a seepage discharge that has been going on for some years. They had a permit previously to discharge whatever it is they are discharging, but it lapsed over time because it was decades old. They are applying for a permit to do exactly what is going on already.”
McCormick said there were between 45 and 50 people at the meeting. Along with concerns about water quality for Van Anda residents, McCormick said there is concern for the environment, such as for the stickleback fish in the adjacent water bodies that are very precious, having morphed from saltwater to freshwater fish, which is being studied by scientists.
“I’m glad the community organized the meeting so concerns could be aired in public,” said McCormick, “and that the mine had the opportunity to speak to those concerns.”
At the April 8 qathet Regional District board meeting, Papalia said his delegation was appearing to shed some light on an application the company has before BC Ministry of Environment and Climate Change Strategy.
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