Farewell to Toja

The Chinese begin to mine ore in Tuva, at the source of the Yenisei. The Chinese promise to give Tuvans what they never expected from Russia

Public environmental organizations, WWF Russia announced the dangers caused by the construction of the Chinese LLC "Lunsin" in Tuva, at the head of one of the greatest rivers in the world, a mining and processing plant (GOK). His work is fraught with the risk of large-scale poisoning of the Yenisei and, accordingly, big problems for Tuva, Khakassia, the Krasnoyarsk Territory

Public environmental organizations, WWF Russia announced the dangers caused by the construction of the Chinese LLC "Lunsin" in Tuva, at the head of one of the greatest rivers in the world, a mining and processing plant (GOK). His work is fraught with the risk of large-scale poisoning of the Yenisei and, accordingly, big problems for Tuva, Khakassia, and the Krasnoyarsk Territory.

Russian in the project is only subsoil, everything else is Chinese; Chinese forces are also mainly involved in construction. In the 90s, it was under such conditions that the Chinese offered cooperation to many Asian regions of Russia, but, for example, in the Krasnoyarsk Territory then they were careful not to become a raw material donor of the PRC. However, it is problematic to make claims to the authorities of Tuva: the Chinese promise to give them something that the Russian state and business have not been able to reach for many years, in particular, a reliable energy supply. And the railway will probably come to Tuva from China faster than from Russia: funding for the construction of the Kuragino-Kyzyl branch, into which Putin hammered the first crutch, has been suspended.

Yevgeny Simonov, a leading expert on such "border" Chinese-Russian businesses, coordinator of the organization "Rivers Without Borders", told Novaya Gazeta that the scheme implemented by Lunsin is common for Chinese resource companies:

— There is practically no benefit in this for our country, because the price of licenses and the payment of duties rarely cover significant social and environmental costs. Zijin Mining Group, whose subsidiary is Longxing LLC, is known for major poisoning of the local population and conflicts both in China and abroad. First, all life around is destroyed during the creation of the mine, competition with the local community grows, and only then, at the stage of developed production, one can expect large-scale pollution and the risk of catastrophic volley discharges.

Todzha, where the Chinese commodity business came, is not just one of the most beautiful places in Siberia, but on the whole planet, it was a huge oasis of hitherto untouched nature. Industrial civilization got here only now. And the trouble is that concern for ecological integrity in impoverished Tuva looks like an unaffordable luxury (although it would seem that it is with it that the prospects of the region should be associated). And the main trouble with this particular project is that the polymetallic ores that are of interest to the Chinese lie on the banks of the Ak-Khem River, one of the tributaries of the Greater Yenisei (Biy-Khem), which, meeting at Kyzyl with Kaa-Khem, form the Yenisei proper. And cedar forests grow above these ores. The design construction area is 480.9 hectares. Hundreds of hectares of cedar have already been destroyed, and a quarry has been dug in the resulting bald patch.

An open-type mine working has a particularly negative effect on the state of the hydrosphere, and this applies not only to water bodies in the vicinity of the quarry, but also to those remote at distances of up to several tens of kilometers. The lowering of the groundwater level leads to a decrease in groundwater runoff into rivers and reservoirs. Ore beneficiation processes are associated with the consumption of large volumes of water, and excess process water is often discharged into open water without treatment.

The GOK project provides for the construction of a landfill for the storage of municipal solid waste and treatment facilities for the treatment of wastewater and drainage water from the landfill. But so far, according to WWF Russia, garbage (construction, industrial and household) is only buried, and there are still no treatment facilities. According to Lunsin's plans, the GOK will start operating next summer, and, as environmentalists fear, everything may end up with 183,000 tons of untreated wastewater being dumped into Ak-Khem every year after its launch.

Meanwhile, the deputy director of Lunsin, Alexander Rusanov, said that sewage treatment plants had already been installed at all residential complexes, and it was not the investor, but the design institute, who set the cutting area he passed the state examination). Also, according to Rusanov, construction is controlled by Rostekhnadzor.

The prosecutor's office of Tuva has repeatedly initiated administrative cases: violation of sanitary and epidemiological norms, legislation on labor and labor protection, on the use of subsoil in violation of the conditions of a license, unauthorized occupation of a water body, violation of the rules for using forests and non-compliance with the rules of sanitary safety in forests, sanitary and epidemiological requirements when applying with waste, etc. However, the fines, of course, are small: in the amount of 640 thousand rubles. For the Chinese, this is "nothing".

The other day, the head of Tuva, Sholban Kara-ool, instructed the deputies of the Todzhinsky kozhuun, elected on October 14, to create a group of public control over the activities of Lunsin and take the site under strict supervision. When Kara-ool came to power in Tuva, the license had already been issued to Lunsin, but in 2009 the government and Lunsin agreed on a public-private partnership, according to which the Chinese side undertook to provide half of the jobs to Tuva residents and participate in financing infrastructure and socially significant objects. And the republican authorities claim that they control the progress of work and the Chinese side meets all their demands and requests.

The Ministry of Economy of Tuva on the official website informs in detail about what the project will bring. So, in general, the Chinese are expected to create 774 jobs, and after the mining and processing plant reaches its design capacity, they will pay at least 1 billion in taxes. In the meantime, “as of July 1, 2012, 56 thousand rubles of taxes were transferred to the budget of the Republic of Tyva” .

The Ministry of Economy of Tuva lists in detail the expenses and benefits of "Lunsin", his financial assistance to the residents and authorities of Tuva. For example. The Chinese helped to buy bedside tables, a refrigerator and a computer for children's sports school. And the children of the poor were bought stationery and New Year's gifts. 20,000 were given to a disabled child, Dongak Onzagai, and 30,000 “for the organization of events of party projects held under the auspices of United Russia.” In total, financial aid was provided for 787,000 rubles last year.

However, you cannot get rid of the impression that you are reading reports from the 50s, or even the 30s of the last century. Expenses for environmental items - the cat cried. It is said that the laying of geofabric and geomembrane has been completed at the solid domestic waste landfill. And that's it.

Alexey Knizhnikov, program coordinator for the environmental policy of the oil and gas sector of WWF Russia:

- Longxing will receive its gigantic profits, the PRC industry will receive the metal it needs, and Russia, it seems, will only get the payment for the lease of the deposit and huge damage in the form of the Yenisei polluted by runoff, cut down cedar taiga, ugly quarries and destroyed ecosystems.

So far, 6 thousand people live in Todzhinsky kozhuun. Vladimir Belogolovov, a geologist, deputy director of the Buryat Regional Association for the Protection of Baikal, speaks of the threat of extinction of a small nationality due to mixing processes. Indeed, due to the influx of Chinese with good earnings (the rotational camp was built for 1,200 people, and these are shifts), it will be difficult for the suitors from the autochthons.

However, it is a big mistake to think that they will cry and step aside. It is the Old Believers who will withdraw and sail away from here. Tuvans are not like that. Therefore, Simonov and a number of other ecologists insist on social and ethnological studies of the possible consequences of these developments. Would it not turn out that the authorities issued a license in addition to the development of Kyzyl-Tashtyg for the assimilation of the Todzhans and the clashes between the natives and alien miners?

Help "New"

The Kyzyl-Tashtyg polymetallic ore deposit is located in the center of the Obruchev Ridge, 200 km northeast of the capital of Tuva, Kyzyl. 47 ore bodies, the volume of balance ore is 13 million tons. The deposit has a very high zinc content. Proved reserves of metal in ore: 1.3 million tons of zinc, 202 thousand tons of lead, 82 thousand tons of copper, 3.5 thousand tons of cadmium, 2 thousand tons of selenium. There is also barium, gold, silver. Longxing, part of China's largest mining holding Zijin Mining Group, won a tender to develop the deposit in 2006. The license for the right to use the subsoil was issued until 2031, the term for mining the deposit is 20 years (the Chinese, however, intend to empty the subsoil in 12 years). The project provides for the first 6 years only open-pit mining (pit 255 meters deep) and the construction of a mining and processing plant, which will produce metal concentrates for further export to China. Commissioning of the GOK is scheduled for six months. Capacity - 1 million tons of ore per year. The project estimate is 10 billion rubles.