Gold miners pollute 2,500 km of Siberian rivers

According to The Insider, citing Alexander Kolotov, coordinator of the Rivers Without Borders environmental coalition, this year activists studied the state of the environment in the southern part of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, in the Altai Republic, Khakassia, Tuva and the Kemerovo Region, where gold mining is most active.

“We used data from the space satellite and sent it to the supervisory authorities. 78 facts of pollution of water bodies involved in the mining of placer gold were revealed. The total length of the identified pollution of water bodies is 2,611 km”, - said the ecologist.

According to experts, in the Krasnoyarsk Territory, gold miners polluted 17 river sections, in Tuva - 19, in Altai - 20, in Khakassia - 6.

“Also, pollution was detected in the Kemerovo region and in the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and in the latter case, many violations and pollution were identified on the Sisim River, not far from the site of last year's dam collapse, which killed 20 people”, - the message says.

Judging by the observations of environmentalists, last year's tragedy in the Krasnoyarsk Territory, which claimed the lives of 20 gold miners who tried to hide pollution and violations in the work, led only to an increase in inspections, but not to a radical improvement in the situation. Many miners in Siberia continue to work illegally and spoil nature.

“Nothing radical has changed. There are more checks, but the gold miners both shit in the rivers and shit, ”says Aleksandr Kolotov.

Especially a lot of pollution was found in hard-to-reach places in Altai, where it is difficult for inspectors to reach. And in Tuva the rivers are literally “cut and disfigured by the mines”.

In addition to gold miners, oil companies cause significant damage to the natural environment, while a significant part of the incidents are hidden . According to Ivan Blokov, Program Director of the Russian branch of Greenpeace, several million tons of oil are spilled in Russia every year. Such volumes can only be compared with Nigeria, where accidents are often associated with vandalism. At the same time, 90% of spills in Russia are due to pipe corrosion. Many companies still operate Soviet oil field pipelines, which are 70% depreciated.

The world's largest onshore oil spill occurred in 1994 near Usinsk in the Komi Republic. At that time, about 200 thousand tons of oil spilled out of the worn out underground oil pipeline. The program director of the Russian branch of Greenpeace said that after two decades nothing has changed there: oil continued to come to the surface, nature did not recover. At the same time, about $ 100 million was allocated to eliminate the consequences.

Because of the disaster in Komi, cattle began to die - oil was found in the animals. Developmental deviations appeared in fish. Along with animals , people suffered, especially children, who were forced to drink water with a high phenol content. From this, the babies developed gastritis. Many liquidators of the accident in Komi are no longer alive: they died early - mainly from oncology.