THE end of an era is here as the world’s largest diversified mining group gets ready to decommission its 43-year-old Bayside Smelter in Richards Bay.
BHP Billiton Aluminium SA employed environmental consultancy SE (Sustainable Environment) Solutions to get the ball rolling on dismantling its Carbon and Reduction plants as well existing ‘legacy’ landfill areas on the site situated near the Port of Richards Bay.
According to a report released by SE Solutions, the Environmental Authorisation (EA) processes for the closure will entail a Basic Assessment Report and a Waste Management License (WML) to ensure safe remediation of the contaminated land.
‘Due to the fact that the ‘legacy’ landfills contain a range of different types of waste, including hazardous waste, it is not immediately clear as to the optimum manner of remediating the site,’ said the report.
‘As a minimum, the Applicant is committed to excavating the waste, segregating the waste and exploring options for re-use, and then disposing of the residual unusable waste in a licensed landfill.
‘Determining the optimal way of giving effect to this commitment requires further investigation, including trenching some of the landfills to properly characterise the waste types and quantities, and even some pilot testing to explore possible re-use options of different types.’
BHP Billiton announced the closure of the facility in January after battling with the operation, ‘which has been under significant and ongoing financial pressure’.
The two local smelters, Bayside and Hillside, along with Billiton’s Mozal plant near Maputo in Mozambique, produced about one-million tonnes of aluminium each year.
