BRAZIL DAM: A federal judge in Brazil has sentenced mining companies BHP, Vale, and their Samarco iron ore joint venture to pay 47.6 billion reais ($9.67 billion) in damages for a disastrous dam break in 2015.
The collapse of the Fundão dam in the southeast of the country resulted in a massive mudslide, killing 19 people.
It also significantly polluted the Rio Doce River, risking the waterway’s route to the Atlantic Ocean.
It needed to be clear how much each corporation was expected to pay.
Judge Vinicius Cobucci ruled that the firms were accountable for “moral damages,” or non-material harm, such as emotional distress experienced by people touched by the occurrence.
Mining Giants Told To Pay $9.7bn Over Brazil Dam Disaster
He further stated that the money, adjusted for inflation since 2015, will be placed in a state fund and used for projects and initiatives in the area affected by the dam collapse.
State and federal public prosecutors filed a civil action, and the ruling was in response.
Vale told the BBC that it had not been informed of the verdict.
The company also stated that as of December last year, the Renova Foundation, which the firms have been utilising to make compensation payments, had handed out 34.7 billion reais.
BHP did not immediately respond to the BBC’s requests for comment. Samarco declined to comment.
The ruling empowers the companies to appeal the outcome.
Samarco is a 50-50 joint venture between Australian mining company BHP Billiton and Brazilian Vale.
The accident in Minas Gerais state, which also displaced 700 people, is regarded as one of the nation’s biggest environmental disasters.
Mining Giants Told To Pay $9.7bn Over Brazil Dam Disaster
When the dam burst, it unleashed a flood of thick, red, poisonous muck, destroying the settlement of Bento Rodrigues.
It also polluted the Rio Doce River and the Atlantic Ocean 650 kilometres away, destroying animals and contaminating drinking water for hundreds of thousands of people.
A 2016 assessment concluded that design deficiencies caused the dam’s collapse.
The technical analysis that Samarco’s joint owners, BHP and Vale, commissioned did not assign blame for the tragedy.
Dams storing mining waste, known as “tailings,” typically feature walls comprising sand-like particles and clay-like silt.
According to the assessment, a change in the Fundão dam’s design between 2011 and 2012 resulted in inefficient water drainage, leading to its collapse on November 5, 2015.
The sand in the dam walls grew saturated and suddenly began to behave more like a liquid, a process known as “liquefaction”.
Mining Giants Told To Pay $9.7bn Over Brazil Dam Disaster
According to the research, a tiny earthquake on the day the dam broke may have “accelerated” the failure.
The catastrophe prompted considerable scrutiny of the mining industry’s safety policies.
BHP and Vale also face a class action lawsuit in the UK, with over 700,000 claimants.
In January 2019, another Vale-owned tailings dam collapsed in the same state near the town of Brumadinho, killing 270 people.
SOURCE – BBC
