Seabridge Gold’s KSM Project’s Tailing Management Facility Confirmed Best Available Technology, B.C.
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Seabridge Gold’s Best Available Tailing Technology (BAT) review for its KSM Project located in British Columbia confirms that the existing tailing management facility design, consisting of centerline dams constructed with double cycloned sand and a till core in association with wet tailings deposition, is the best available technology for tailings deposition and the most environmentally responsible design to minimize long term risks associated with the proposed tailing storage facility for the KSM Project. This conclusion confirms the findings from KSM’s independent geotechnical review board that the TMF’s design is robust and appropriate for KSM’s site specific characteristics.
Seabridge commissioned Klohn Crippen Berger to undertake the BAT review in August 2015 in response to the independent expert engineering investigation and review panel report on the breach of the Mount Polley tailing storage facility. The review panel concluded that future projects require not only an improved adoption of best applicable practices (BAP), but also a migration to best available technology (BAT). The Klohn Crippen Berger report also meets the new BC Mining Code requirement that new mines must provide an alternate assessment of BAT in their provincial permit applications.
“We are very pleased that the TMF design we included in the KSM project design that received provincial and gederal environmental assessment approval has been confirmed in the BAT report as the best possible design for eliminating risks associated with operation and closure. We are further encouraged that Klohn Crippen Berger specifically determined that filtered tailing options are impractical and would result in greater environmental impacts and risks, contrary to the assertions of many environmental groups who have advocated that only filtered tailing disposal technologies should be implemented. I would like to thank Klohn Crippen Berger for their exemplary work in completing this study,” said Seabridge Chairman and CEO Rudi Fronk.
As a further step in its review process, Seabridge commissioned an independent review of the BAT report by Dr. Dirk van Zyl. Dr. van Zyl is a world-recognized expert in tailings, mined-earth structures and sustainability with more than 40 years of experience. He is currently a faculty member at UBC’s faculty of Applied Science and was a member of the independent expert engineering investigation and review panel investigating the Mount Polley tailing storage facility breach.
“I support the overall conclusions of the KSM BAT report. The evaluation shows that using filtered tailings at this project is not a feasible option as it will not result in moving to zero failures. Adding complexity in tailings management, as filtered tailings will do at the KSM site, does not promote the overall goal of moving to zero failures,” said van Zyl.
About Seabridge Gold
Seabridge Gold holds a 100 percent interest in several North American gold resource projects. The company’s principal assets are the KSM and Iskut properties located near Stewart, British Columbia, Canada and the Courageous Lake gold project located in Canada’s Northwest Territories.
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