Report on the Proposed Voisey's Bay Mine and Mill Project

The Voisey's Bay Nickel Company (VBNC) proposes to mine nickel, together with some copper and cobalt, at a location in northern Labrador, 35km south of Nain and 79km north of Utshimassits (Davis Inlet), VBNC would start by mining 32 million tonnes of ore from an open pit, while carrying out more exploration to find out exactly how much ore is underground. VBNC would then develop an underground mine, where it hopes to be able to mine another 118 million tonnes. VBNC would process the ore in a mill on site to produce concentrates. The main waste product coming out of the mill would be finely ground rock called tailings. The tailings, together with some of the waste rock excavated from the open pit and the underground mine, would be stored under water in two tailings basins made from existing lakes. This would prevent the tailings and rock from being in contact with both air and water simultaneously, which would cause them to release acid. VBNC would transport the concentrates from Edward's Cove by ship to another location, as yet undecided for further processing. At first, the ships would not have to travel through landfast ice but eventually VBNC would want to ship year round, except when the ice is forming or in the early spring. During the hearings, VBNC said char the Project would create 570 jobs during construction, 420 jobs in the open pit phase and 950 jobs in the underground phase. Only about half of the workers would be on site at any one time, because they would work and live at the site for two weeks. VBNC would not build a new town at the mine site.