A GRAPHITE MINE
ON OUR TERRITORY
(LA LOUTRE): THE IMPACTS ON THE POPULATION
SIGNIFICANT RISKS ASSOCIATED
WITH THE EXPLOITATION
OF THIS ORE
The management of these risks, by the company LOMIKO, raises fears about the process of extraction and transformation of this ore. In the process, a substantial concentration needs to be obtained from the extracted rock and then the waste materials, or tailings, are stored. It is about pollution – noise, dust, toxic substances, and more. These unwanted elements move towards our homes and places of work and leisure, in the air (via the wind) and in the water (via the watershed). The collective well-being would be disrupted, and what about the economic consequences?
Do you want to know more about the operation of an open pit graphite mine? See how the LOMIKO company proposes to extract graphite in our area.
Graphite at
the La Loutre
site
A PROCESS AGAINST NATURE
An open pit mine is the conventional method for mining graphite that includes three large excavated pits. These mining operations begin with holes being drilled for the insertion of explosive charges to shatter the rock. The broken rock is then loaded by hydraulic excavators and front-end loaders into dump trucks. Rock that has a graphite concentration of less than 2.5% is rejected as waste material; rock which contains more is sent to the plant’s first conveyor of the plant to be processed and stored there according to the criteria established by the mining company.
On the La Loutre site, the average concentration of graphite in the source rock is 6.9%. The goal of the operations is to obtain 95% concentrated ore, so it is necessary to determine which of the three or four transformational stages (increasingly fine) are needed: crushing, vibration, hydrocyclone filtration (a device that uses centrifugal force to separate particles heavier than water), or the polishing grind. Through these steps, large quantities of water are used to capture the ore by scraping it into flotation tanks. During this operation, it is also necessary to plan for a significant consumption of diesel and isobutyl methyl carbinol (C6H14O), which is a cleaning product commonly used for disc brakes.
Once the graphite is extracted, the final tailings are first filtered and pre-dried using propane-fired furnaces, and then trucked to the disposal site with waste rock. This site is directly connected to the three collection and sedimentation ponds. If metals (example: iron) were present in the rock, sodium hydroxide (NaOH), hydrochloric (HCl) or sulfuric (H2SO4) acid would normally be used to remove these impurities.
Reference: EEP Document – Auscenco page 39
TONS OF MATERIALS
It is expected that the La Loutre mine could process 4,200 tons (per day) of ore containing approximately 265 tons of graphite, 365 days per year over a period of 15 years. Such a yield means that some 110,270,000 tons of raw material would have to be detonated and moved. This represents 2,670,000 tons of soil that contains no useful material (overburden: sedimentary layer to be removed before reaching the ore), 85,726,000 tons of waste rock, and 21,874,000 tons of ore containing graphite to be crushed and processed. It is important to mention that graphite is classified as “ carcinogenic and toxic ” in cases of repeated exposure.
Reference: EEP Document – Auscenco page 32
WE MUST CONVEY OUR COMPLETE DISAGREEMENT WITH THIS MINING PROJECT
Join the Regroupement de la Protection des Lacs de la Petite-Nation.