Brazilian miner Vale, prosecutors agree new waterworks deadline

Prosecutors and representatives of Brazilian mining firm Vale agreed a new timetable for the conclusion of works to collect water from the Paraopeba River in Minas Gerais state. 

After the company’s tailings dam in Brumadinho city collapsed on January 2019, causing 270 deaths and the contamination of the river, which supplies state capital Belo Horizonte, company representatives promised to build a new collection point and treatment station.

Works were expected to be finished in September 2020.

“This deadline underwent constant readjustments, and now, finally, the work is to be delivered by Vale, despite the existence, still, of some pending issues, which motivated the signing of a new addendum that establishes definitive timeframes for its solution in the shortest time technically possible,” Carlos Bruno Ferreira da Silva, a federal prosecutor, said in a statement. 

Vale will have around two weeks to submit a schedule covering tests, pre-operation, assisted operation and definitive transfer, to the state’s water utility, Copasa.