Some Nevada Mining Reports Open Eyes On Extent Of Mercury Emissions

As Hg-ATME has reported (several Nevada Posts are here) Nevada began cracking down on gold mining operations in the state, requiring testing to actually determine the levels of mercury being emitted. Heretofore the amounts were only estimated by the mines, and estimated quite poorly I might add. From Yubanet.com an excerpt from a recent article;

New emissions data, obtained from the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection (NDEP), show that northern Nevada gold mines are still under-reporting substantial amounts of mercury air pollution. It also reveals that a number of mines that were previously considered small sources of mercury air pollution are actually very large sources, yet these mines have few pollution controls in place. Until 2006, mines were not required to actually measure mercury releases, only estimate mercury emissions.
[...]
"We now know that hundreds of pounds of mercury are needlessly going into our air from mines that have minimal controls in place," said John Hadder of Great Basin Mine Watch. "This new information is a wake-up call. We want the State and industry to agree to get controls in place right away."

Under Nevada's new mercury regulations, the four largest mercury polluters were prioritized as "Tier 1" mines and all the smaller emitters as "Tier 2" mines based on information available at the time. The new emissions data, however, reveals that a number of the Tier 2 mines are actually large sources of mercury air pollution. For example:

* The Florida Canyon mine submitted no mercury pollution reports to the EPA for the last eight years, yet the new information indicates that the mine is a large source of emissions, reporting 440 pounds of emissions in a 2006 report to NDEP.

* The Rawhide Mine submitted reports to the EPA of just 0-1 pound of emissions for each of previous 8 years, yet it reported 351 pounds of emissions to NDEP in 2006. The mine is currently winding down operations.

Other "Tier 2" mines that are now reporting large emissions include the Newmont Lone Tree mine at 622 pounds and the Glamis Gold mine at 1,010 pounds in 2006.

And this added information from Desert News below;

An employee at the Florida Canyon mine referred questions to mine manager Martin Price, who was not immediately available for comment.

The Rawhide mine is owned by Utah-based Kennecott, a subsidiary of the international conglomerate Rio Tinto.

Rio Tinto spokesman Louie Cononelos said he could not comment until hearing back from Rawhide officials.

Mark Amodei, president of the Nevada Mining Association, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

The three environmental groups gave the two mines a 60-day notice of their intent to sue over alleged failure to report mercury emissions as required under federal law.