Thorunn Howatt
Northern News Services

Yellowknife (Feb 27/02) - After a three-year wait hearings will finally begin for permitting on three new Ekati mine projects.

"We need to get those permits before we can begin the main development activity," said BHP Billiton company spokesperson Graham Nicholls. "We don't have the permits although we applied over three years ago originally."

The company is looking for permitting -- a class-A licence -- to begin work on three diamond-mining projects called Sable, Beartooth and Pigeon. The ventures are part of expansion at BHP Billiton's Ekati Mine that includes roadwork and water management regarding the proposed Sable pit.

BHP Billiton applied to the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board for permitting on the project three years ago. The application was rerouted to environmental review.

"We finished our environmental assessment of the Pigeon, Beartooth and Sable about a year ago," said the Mackenzie Valley Environmental Impact Review Board's Roland Semjanovs.

A report that included a list of 62 suggestions was then sent to the federal minister of Northern and Indian Affairs, "And from there, once the minister accepts the recommendations, then the permit application for the water license goes back into the regulatory side of things," said Semjanovs. So it's back in the land and water board's court, complete with suggestions from the environmental review board.

"We required a preliminary screening to be done on that report," said Karl Lauten of the Mackenzie Valley Land and Water Board.

The land and water board came back with an extensive list of information requests. After other agencies responded, BHP then returned the information requests with a 500-page document. Then it was the reviewer's turn again. "We're at the point now where we have set up a public hearing," said Lauten.

Piles of paper

Sifting through all of the related documentation is one reason why the process has taken so long. But another reason is that the land and water board wasn't in existence when the original permit was applied for. Before the Mackenzie Valley Board, the permitting agency for water use was the NWT Water Board. The Department of Northern and Indian Affairs regulated land.

So BHP Billiton's original application was submitted to the NWT Water Board. When the new board was created, BHP Billiton had to submit a new application. That was last year.

"This is the first time we have run through this process," said Lauten.

The public hearings, scheduled for early April in Yellowknife, will address the water licence. The land-use permits will be dealt with separately.

"Members of the public, First Nations, whoever has remaining concerns can provide them as an intervention or a brief to the board," he said, pointing to environmental, planning or construction as possible causes for alarm.

"The licence is the last stage where you get to put in content that will mitigate any remaining concerns," said Lauten. A class-A licence is the same type the City of Yellowknife operates under. The diamond mines use a tremendous amount of water -- the settlements that grow up over the tundra are the size of small towns.