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(Bloomberg) — Canada’s Yukon Territory wants to eventually reopen a gold mine it seized from Victoria Gold Corp. after a major landslide and cyanide spill at the facility earlier this summer.
Yukon’s government said Friday it moved to place Victoria Gold into receivership because of environmental concerns at the Eagle Mine and so that the operation can reopen after clean-up efforts are completed.
“We chose this course of action so that Victoria Gold and mining could resume at this site,” Yukon’s Attorney General Tracy-Anne McPhee said in a press briefing. “We had no intention of ending the work of that corporation, but the environmental concerns were simply not being addressed to our satisfaction.”
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The Canadian company suspended operations at Eagle Mine in June following a failure at its heap leach facility, where mined ore is stacked into piles and sprinkled with cyanide-laced water. Since then, Yukon’s government has said it has identified elevated levels of cyanide in nearby waterways that has killed wildlife. Victoria Gold has disputed those claims.
The appointment of PricewaterhouseCoopers as receiver of Victoria Gold and its assets on Wednesday followed weeks of mitigation efforts at the site. The receiver will undertake further mitigation work at the mine site with funding from the Yukon, according to the government, though it did not provide a timeline on the clean-up effort. The government said the money advanced for the efforts will constitute a debt that will be recovered from Victoria Gold’s assets.
“A lack of action by Victoria Gold left us with serious concerns about the heap leach failure,” said McPhee.
Victoria Gold’s board of directors resigned following the receivership placement on Wednesday. Chief Executive Officer John McConnell told Canada’s CBC News on Thursday he thinks the receivership is “totally unnecessary.”
The company did not immediately respond on Friday to a request for comment.
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