Vale announces plan to shut down risky mines. Vale shares still labeled a ‘buy’. Veteran Renan Calheiros gets stronger in bid for Senate President .
Vale announces plan to shut down risky mines
Mining giant Vale has presented the government with a plan to shut down residue dams similar to the ones used in Mariana and Brumadinho. These dams are of the cheapest, most unsafe kind, growing through walls built over the residue itself (picture below). The plan will cost BRL 5bn and would mean Vale will temporarily reduce its annual output by roughly 40m tons of iron ore — 10% of the total.
CEO Fabio Schvartsman said the company owns 19 such dams — nine of which had already been deactivated. Prosecutors want the company to commit to the plan in writing. But this might not be enough. One-third of Vale-owned dams (56 of 175) have a “high potential for damage” and, if they collapse, each could generate a disaster similar to what we are witnessing in Brumadinho.
Yesterday, police arrested two engineers who had attested that the Brumadinho dam was compliant with safety requirements....