The Tsilhqot'in Nation says it believes the three-member panel appointed this week to review Taseko Mines' controversial New Prosperity mine project near Williams Lake will come to the same conclusion they have.
"We are confident that upon scrutiny, that the work undertaken by this new panel will completely confirm the previous panel's findings that this alternative version of the mine poses even greater environmental risk," said Tsilhqot'in National Government Tribal Chair Chief Joe Alphonse.
The panel will consist of Bill Ross, a professor emeritus at the University of Calgary in the faculty of environmental design, who will serve as chairman, George Kupfer, a consultant and water management expert, and Ron Smyth, former chief geologist of the British Columbia Geological Survey.
In November, Taseko was given the green light to take the proposal through a second environmental assessment by a federal review panel.
The $1.5-billion project, planned for a site 125 kilometres southwest of Williams Lake, was rejected by Ottawa in 2010 after a negative environmental assessment of a plan that would have turned Fish Lake into a tailings pond.
The company has since reworked its design to save the lake at an added cost of $300 million in capital and operating expenses to the proposed mine, which was previously expected to cost about $800 million.
However, the Tsilhqot'in Nation has continued to strongly object to the revised plan, saying it had already been rejected by the previous panel because Environment Canada and the company itself testified that it posed a higher environmental risk.
The panel will use the work done in the first review as part of its assessment, including a 2009 environmental impact statement.
A final report to the minister is expected within 235 days after the company submits its revised environmental impact statement.
Taseko has estimated the project would create 700 construction jobs for two years and 550 direct jobs and 1,280 indirect jobs over its 20-year operating life.
