DR1 Daily News - Dominican Republic

Photo: Listín Diario

The expansion project for the Barrick Pueblo Viejo gold mine in Sanchez Ramirez province calls for constructing a second tailings dam in the same province to extend the duration of the mining activities through 2040. Other provinces had rejected the installation. The Earthworks blog says that 450 families living in six towns next to the Pueblo Viejo mine will have to be relocated to build the second tailings dam.

The blog mentions that geophysicist Steven Emerman visited to conduct an independent review of the Environmental Impact Study for the tailings dam and established that the Environmental Impact Study as submitted, needs to be completed because it bases decisions on documents and studies that still need to be finished. Likewise, there are no documents with details on the stability of the current tailings dam at the mine, even when...