Government continues to manage Texas silver mine

The Queensland Government continues to actively manage the former Texas Silver Mine site, Environment Minister Dr Steven Miles said today.

Dr Miles – who inspected the site last Friday (15 April) - said significant resources had been directed towards addressing the site's “legacy of environmental issues”, which were inherited by the Queensland Government.

The Department of Environment and Heritage Protection has been working with the Department of Natural Resources and Mines to manage possible environmental impacts associated with the former silver mine, located 7.5 kilometres east of Texas, south-west of Brisbane.

Dr Miles said the Queensland Government held $2.06 million in financial assurance for the mine site.

“We’ve so far spent about $400,000 of the total financial assurance, and will use the remainder for further works to safeguard the environment and reduce the potential for any releases,’ he said.

Dr Miles said estimates of costs to fully rehabilitate the site ranged from $6.9 million to $9.8 million.

“The Queensland Government has introduced a bill to Parliament to ensure that in future mine operators can’t simply walk away from their responsibilities if they choose to shut down their operations, such as has happened here in Texas,’ he said.

“If passed, the Environmental Protection (Chain of Responsibility) Amendment Bill will provide stronger laws to deal with the issue of businesses leaving Queensland taxpayers with costly environmental clean-up bills.

“Among other things, the bill imposes a chain of responsibility, giving the Queensland Government the ability to pursue these companies and their related parties to meet the cost of managing and rehabilitating sites,” Dr Miles said.

The mine opened in 2001 with the most recent operator being Texas Silver Mines Pty Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Alcyone Resources Limited.

The mine was placed in “care and maintenance” a number of times since it opened, with production ceasing in 2014 and Texas Silver Mines Pty Ltd going into liquidation on 25 July 2015.

“The liquidator issued a Notice of Disclaimer under the Federal Corporations Act on 28 August 2015, effectively severing their environmental obligations and the Queensland Government had no choice but to take responsibility for the site,” Dr Miles said.

“Our primary focus since then has been to prevent a release of contaminated water and pursue options for further reducing water volumes on site.”

As well as an open pit, a waste rock dump and a mineral processing facility, the site includes processing ponds and two dams that collectively hold almost 240 million litres (mega-litres) of contaminated water containing silver mining by-products such as copper, aluminium, iron, manganese, zinc and nickel.

“A number of works have been designed and installed to ensure that any contaminated stormwater is captured and contained on site,” Dr Miles said

“Evaporation systems were put in place and more work is underway to further increase the size of these systems.

“As a result, stormwater from a very large rainfall event in January was contained to prevent any contaminated water discharges.

“This is particularly important as any discharge has the potential to enter the Dumaresq River, which is a major source of irrigation water for agriculture in the region.

“With the coming of the winter months and generally lower rainfall in the region, the works completed at the site should ease any potential for negative environmental outcomes from the mine,’ he said.

ENDS

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