Google Earth, Barrick Gold & their wonderful gift to the DR!

NALs

Economist by Profession
Jan 20, 2003
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I was recently told that Google Earth had updated many photos through out the DR, and me being me, I had to check it out.

Fair enough, everything was going well.

Then I zoomed in the Cotu? area and the image over the Pueblo Viejo gold mine (currently under concession with Barrick Gold) looked quite nice and clear:

barrick1.jpg


Yes, the mountain is being destroyed, but that's normal mining practice (look at the Falconbridge Ferronickel mine near Bonao). On the other side its still covered in a nice and dense forest, but then I noticed this river:

barrick2.jpg


On the plains the forest has been cleared a little and the river is much more visible:

barrick3.jpg


And look where all that crap is being dumped into:

barrick4.jpg


For the geographically illiterate, that's the Hatillo dam reservoir. I think part of that water is used in some nearby aqueducts, but I'm certain in many areas of the reservoir people like to socialize and go in for a bath or to frolic in the water. Entire families go there with the kids having plenty of fun in that water.

Thanks Barrick Gold for such a considerate gift. :mad:

BTW, there are other mines clearly visible in Google Earth (Falconbridge near Bonao, Cabo Rojo in Pedernales, etc) and none have this 'gift' that Barrick Gold is giving the country from the bottom of their heart. :rolleyes:
 

AJL6767

New member
Apr 14, 2011
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From what i understand, mining operations have not started yet, and preparation is still ongoing. You wrote about " crap " but have you or anyone done analysis on what is going into the water? Maybe you can post the chemical results so we can look at this in an intelligent manner. I know that they have spent a vast sum of $ bringing in equipment to process and eliminate many pollutants from mining and to protect the enviorment. How much of this have you seen.
I prefer to hear the full story before determining whether anything wrong is going on.
 

dunroamin

Member
Oct 12, 2010
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Pollution of Hatillo resovoir from Pueblo Viejo mine

Good images of the mine.

The pollution of the Hatillo resovoir from the Pueblo Viejo mine predates Barrick. Barrick has yet to start processing.

The pollution comes from the residues from the processing when the mine was state run. At that time the residues were put into polders, These polders leak into the local rivers. This was a scandal long before the mine was let as a concession to Barrick's predecessor.

When I lived in the area ten years ago I was strongly advised not to eat fish from Hatillo.

This is a scandal but the blame belongs with the state.
 

AJL6767

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Apr 14, 2011
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Thanks for clarifying that. It is what I knew all along, but it is better that someone else replied. It seemed to me, that the author of the thread was looking to blame Barrick for things that were not their doing. This is common in the DR. What is not said, is that when they start producing, if done as they say will do, it will create a nice source of income for the DR and help alleviate some of the financial problems here.
During the Balaguer years I suggested to him and others that the DR had an army doing absolutely zero, and that they could be used to flatten out the hills between where the mine is and the valley of cibao and almost duplicate the area available for agricltural production. This was nowhere near a priority then, but may be a good idea now. We also discussed using the cane sugar alcohol to be added to gasoline to reduce oil imports, but the government had a bg stake in the refineries.
 

SosuaSam

Member
Jan 4, 2010
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Barrick is actually doing some cleanup of the damage caused by the Dominican governemnt owned mine, including dismantling their rusted out buildings they left behind when they walked away. The Dominican company mined the top of the mountains so the disturbance you see is mainly theirs. Obviously money from the gold sales went into government coffers and likley helped build Dominican's national infrastructure like highways, power plants, etc.. so you can decide if the cost was worth the benefit. I think it was.
 

NALs

Economist by Profession
Jan 20, 2003
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Ooops. :)

In that case, this thread should serve as a collection of before images. At a future date, when GE updates the images, we should see whether there has been any progress or not.