5/23/2002
MINING INDUSTRY TRI DATA SHOWS ON-SITE MANAGEMENT OF
NATURALLY OCCURRING MATERIALS
The Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) data due to be publicly released by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today shows that, overall, mining facility releases for calendar year 2000 are generally lower than for the previous reporting year and are characterized as follows:
· Between 85% and 99% of what all mining operations reported is the naturally occurring metals that remain in low concentration in the large volume of rock that is moved, stored, processed and managed at the mine site.
· This material is safely contained in managed facilities at the site.
· Releases of cyanide reported by gold mines and sulfuric acid reported by copper mines are confined to the mine site, where employees and facilities are monitored to ensure safe operations. Both chemicals are used to extract the metals from the rock in which it is found.
EPA has issued a special report for the year 2000 data on persistent bioaccumulative and toxic substances, including mercury. Mercury is one of the metals that occurs naturally in the rock at mining operations. According to EPA’s analysis of the reported data, 99% of the mercury reported by the mining industry is managed on-site at the mine.
Within the coal mining sector, EPA noted that reported volumes were slightly up due to the addition of two new operations to the TRI data.
TRI is a volume-based report and is not intended to evaluate risk, but rather to provide general information to the public. It is an annual report that covers nearly 650 chemicals and substances. This is the third year TRI data from the mining industry has been reported.
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