ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT REPORT and ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT PROGRAMME REPORT
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ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT REPORT And ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT PROGRAMME REPORT SUBMITTED FOR ENVIRONMENTAL AUTHORIZATIONS IN TERMS OF THE NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT ACT, 1998 AND THE NATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL MANAGEMENT WASTE ACT, 2008 IN RESPECT OF LISTED ACTIVITIES THAT HAVE BEEN TRIGGERED BY APPLICATIONS IN TERMS OF THE MINERAL AND PETROLEUM RESOURCES DEVELOPMENT ACT, 2002 (MPRDA) (AS AMENDED). NAME OF APPLICANT: Tasman Pacific Minerals Limited TEL NO: 023 414 4566 FAX NO: 023 414 4566 POSTAL ADDRESS: P.O. Box 1225, Beaufort West, 6970 PHYSICAL ADDRESS: Site Office: 16 Stanbridge Street, Beaufort West FILE REFERENCE NUMBER SAMRAD: WC 30/5/1/2/2/10072 MR, SUBMISSION DATE: 25 January 2016 1. IMPORTANT NOTICE In terms of the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Act (Act 28 of 2002 as amended), the Minister must grant a prospecting or mining right if among others the mining “will not result in unacceptable pollution, ecological degradation or damage to the environment”. Unless an Environmental Authorisation can be granted following the evaluation of an Environmental Impact Assessment and an Environmental Management Programme report in terms of the National Environmental Management Act (Act 107 of 1998) (NEMA), it cannot be concluded that the said activities will not result in unacceptable pollution, ecological degradation or damage to the environment. In terms of section 16(3)(b) of the EIA Regulations, 2014, any report submitted as part of an application must be prepared in a format that may be determined by the Competent Authority and in terms of section 17 (1) (c) the competent Authority must check whether the application has taken into account any minimum requirements applicable or instructions or guidance provided by the competent authority to the submission of applications. It is therefore an instruction that the prescribed reports required in respect of applications for an environmental authorisation for listed activities triggered by an application for a right or a permit are submitted in the exact format of, and provide all the information required in terms of, this template. Furthermore please be advised that failure to submit the information required in the format provided in this template will be regarded as a failure to meet the requirements of the Regulation and will lead to the Environmental Authorisation being refused. It is furthermore an instruction that the Environmental Assessment Practitioner must process and interpret his/her research and analysis and use the findings thereof to compile the information required herein. (Unprocessed supporting information may be attached as appendices). The EAP must ensure that the information required is placed correctly in the relevant sections of the Report, in the order, and under the provided headings as set out below, and ensure that the report is not cluttered with un-interpreted information and that it unambiguously represents the interpretation of the applicant. 2. OBJECTIVE OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT PROCESS The objective of the environmental impact assessment process is to, through a consultative process— (a) determine the policy and legislative context within which the activity is located and document how the proposed activity complies with and responds to the policy and legislative context; (b) describe the need and desirability of the proposed activity, including the need and desirability of the activity in the context of the preferred location; (c) identify the location of the development footprint within the preferred site based on an impact and risk assessment process inclusive of cumulative impacts and a ranking process of all the identified development footprint alternatives focusing on the geographical, physical, biological, social, economic, heritage and cultural aspects of the environment; (d) determine the—- (i) nature, significance, consequence, extent, duration and probability of the impacts occurring to inform identified preferred alternatives; and (ii) degree to which these impacts— (aa) can be reversed; (bb) may cause irreplaceable loss of resources, and (cc) can be avoided, managed or mitigated; (e) identify the most ideal location for the activity within the preferred site based on the lowest level of environmental sensitivity identified during the assessment; (f) identify, assess, and rank the impacts the activity will impose on the preferred location through the life of the activity; (g) identify suitable measures to manage, avoid or mitigate identified impacts; and (h) identify residual risks that need to be managed and monitored. PART A SCOPE OF ASSSSMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT REPORT 3. Contact Person and correspondence address a) Details of i) Details of the EAP Name of The Practitioner: Dr. R.H. Boer Tel No.: +27 12 753 1284/5 or 2783 441 0239, 082 482 6202 Fax No. : 086 716 5576 e-mail address: [email protected] - Cc [email protected] ii) Expertise of the EAP. (1) The qualifications of the EAP (with evidence). Rudy Boer graduated with a PhD (Geochemistry) in 1995 from the University of the Witwatersrand. He, furthermore, received post-graduate tuition during long-term sojourns at the following institutions: Centre de Recherches sur la Geologie des Matieres Premieres Minerales et Energetiques (CREGU), Nancy, France; Laboratoire de Spectrométrie de Vibrations, Université de Nancy I, Nancy, France; Department of Geological Sciences, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, United States of America. After four years with the Economic Geology Research Unit, he joined the Department of Geology at the University of the Witwatersrand. During the eight years that he was employed at the University of the Witwatersrand, he was involved in a wide variety of applied economic geology and exploration geochemistry projects. Subsequently, he took up a professorship at the University of the Free State where his main responsibilities included the development, co- ordination and management of a newly introduced Masters degree programme in Mineral Resource Management.Rudy is a Fellow of the Geological Society of South Africa (Mem. No. 964609), from which he has also received the Jubilee Medal. He currently serves on several Water Research Commission Project Steering Committees and is registered with the South African Council for Natural Scientific Professions (Reg. No. 400010/03). (2) Summary of the EAP’s past experience. (In carrying out the Environmental Impact Assessment Procedure) He was author and co-author of more than 30 technical peer reviewed publications in international journals and approximately 40 extended abstracts published in conference proceedings, as well as numerous technical publications. He has also been responsible for the project management of over 140 environmental projects ranging from water use license applications to mining right environmental management plans. See Appendix 2 for further detail. b) Description of the property. Farm Name: See attached Schedule 1 in Appendix 3 Application area (Ha) 10623.9823Ha Magisterial district: Beaufort West Distance and direction +/- 10km south-east of Beaufort West from nearest town 21 digit Surveyor See attached Schedule 1 in Appendix 3 General Code for each farm portion c) Locality map (show nearest town, scale not smaller than 1:250000). See Attached Appendix 3. d) Description of the scope of the proposed overall activity. Provide a plan drawn to a scale acceptable to the competent authority but not less than 1: 10 000 that shows the location, and area (hectares) of all the aforesaid main and listed activities, and infrastructure to be placed on site Lukisa JV Company (Pty) Ltd (“Lukisa JVCo”) and Tasman Pacific Minerals Limited (“Tasman Pacific”) together hold forty (40) prospecting rights covering an area of around seven thousand, five hundred and forty nine square kilometres (7,509 km²) for uranium and molybdenum in the Karoo region of South Africa (spread between the Western, Eastern and Northern Cape Provinces) approximately four hundred kilometres (400 km) northeast of Cape Town. The respective companies commenced exploration activities in 2005/2006 to evaluate historic deposits located on these properties and convert them to modern resource compliance standards. Lukisa JVCo and Tasman Pacific, which are applying for mining rights for uranium ore (U) and molybdenum ore (Mo), are subsidiaries of Peninsula Energy Limited, an ASX-listed Australian company. The applications are for consolidated blocks of properties contained in the original prospecting right areas, but clustered according to geographic location in order to simplify the application areas and reduce administrative burden. The proposed mining operation is to be known as the Tasman RSA Mines and will be operated as a single entity, but with multiple production centres feeding a central processing plant (CPP) to be located near the main orebody of the initial mining stages (within the Eastern Block application area). Therefore this Mining Work Programme (MWP) is designed for a single mining operation initially, but is submitted for all the individual mining right applications with reference to each application block and will be updated as additional resources and reserves are developed. Open Pit and Underground Mining Where orebodies lie close to the surface, they would be accessed by open cut mining, involving a pit and the removal of much overburden (overlying rock) as well as a lot of waste rock. Where orebodies are deeper, underground mining would be employed, involving