| Abstract/Description or Keywords |
On August 4, 2014, the Mount Polley copper and gold mine tailings dam breached, and over the next three days the four-square-kilometre pond drained, releasing approximately 17 million cubic metres of tailings water and eight million cubic metres of tailings into Polley Lake, Quesnel Lake and Hazeltine Creek. Following the spill, the Government of British Columbia (BC) and the company released technical, environmental and assessment reports that described pre-event infrastructure issues, post-event impacts to the receiving environments, and future pathways for re-permitting. To date, no assessment has identified the communities impacted by this event, nor how they were impacted, from a social or health perspective. The two main objectives of this project are to: (1) address this gap in knowledge by identifying potentially impacted communities and; (2) undertake the initial phases of a health impact assessment (HIA) of the Mount Polley Mine event, using international assessment standards. This project was funded by the First Nations Health Authority (FNHA). Established in 2013, the FNHA plans, designs, manages, delivers and funds First Nations Health programs across BC. The following report describes findings from the screening and scoping phases of the Mount Polley Mine HIA. |
