Opponents of a proposed Central Otago goldmine have ramped up their campaign this week, with public meetings in Dunedin and Wānaka.
Australian company Santana Minerals has signalled plans to seek a fast-track permit for a mine between Bendigo and Ophir, where it estimated it could extract gold worth $4.4 billion.
Lobby group Sustainable Tarras Inc raised concerns about the mine’s visibility on the landscape – particularly the inclusion of one large, 1000x850m open pit mine, three smaller satellite pits and a tailings dam.
The group also expressed concerns about large quantities of cyanide being stored upstream of the Clutha River, and the potential impact the project would have on the region’s tourism and viticulture.
Chair Suze Keith said about 50 people turned up in Dunedin on Tuesday and more than 100 had registered for the meeting in Wānaka on Thursday night.
Speakers included academics, environmental advocates and Labour Party MP for Dunedin Rachel Booking.
Ms Keith said the idea of the meetings was “to make a bit of noise”.
“We don’t think that a project of this scale and of its nature is well suited to fast-tracking decision-making,” she said. “It might make the decisions come out quickly, but we’ve got 10 years of operation of this thing and then we’ve got the perpetual liability of a toxic tailings dam.”
Santana Minerals has held its own public drop-in sessions at Tarras and Cromwell to discuss the project, with two more planned in coming weeks.
The company said the fast-track application aimed to accelerate decision-making, “but it did not override the requirements of the Resource Management Act or other applicable legislation”.
Keith said the process had fuelled concerns about limited public input.
“People are really interested to understand where it is and what it comprises, because a goldmine is not just a mess of a open hole on the ground, it’s got a whole lot of other moving parts to it,” she said. “What are the implications for the immediate area and the wider area in terms of what it would mean if it does go ahead?”
Santana Minerals said the proposed mine was expected to have low visibility, due to surrounding landforms, and environmental considerations were “central” to project planning.
It said the processing plant would be located in the lower Shepherds Valley, “strategically sited to leverage natural topography, thereby minimising potential impacts from noise, light, dust, and visibility”.
Its tailings dam would be built to the highest safety standards, including resilience to a 1-in-10,000 year seismic event, it said, and the company described the work to support its consent application as “one of the most intensive and comprehensive studies ever conducted on the Dunstan Mountains”.
Several key ecological reports were still underway and the company planned to lodge its application “at the earliest opportunity”.
