A few thoughts about the Mount Polley tailings pond spill:
- As Citizen columnist and UNBC professor Todd Whitcombe rightly pointed out in his Monday column, there has been plenty of overheated language used to describe the failure of the tailings pond and the spill into Quesnel Lake. Many reports used the word "disaster" and "catastrophic" to describe an event where no one was killed, no one was hurt and no homes were lost. As Whitcombe explained wearing his chemistry professor's hat, the word "toxic" was also batted around to describe elements that we come into contact with in our natural environment. Isolated and in high quanitities, arsenic is toxic but so is oxygen, Whitcombe quipped. Well said, sir.
- On the other side of the coin, Premier Christy Clark and mining minister Bill Bennett were quick to stress that the initial water tests turned out fine (more were to come later Monday) as if the only issue was the quality of the water and the potential damage it could do to the watershed and the salmon run. The quality of the water was certainly a concern but the quantity of water did plenty of damage. The rapid release of so much water obliterated a creek, swept away thousands of trees, eroded tons of soil, and washed away fish and wildlife habitat. To say nothing happened because the water quality was fine is the equivalent of someone waking up after a 36-hour bachelor party bender in Vegas and insisting it's all good because he didn't overdose or get alcohol poisoning. The bender is irresponsible and unsafe behavior. So is having a tailings pond spill. This was an accident that shouldn't have happened. Imperial Metals needs to clean up its mess and the mining industry needs to demonstrate that it is doing everything in its power, beyond what is legally required, to prevent similar accidents.
- With that in mind, however, there is no need to overreact to this spill, although it's a common human reaction to do so. Daniel Kahneman, the Nobel Prize laureate, wrote about what he called the "availability bias," which is the belief that a rare and traumatic event that recently occurred is seen to be far more likely to occur again than it really is. To use Nassim Nicholas Taleb's analogy, one we see a black swan, we're convinced that next one is just around the corner, even though the likelihood of actually seeing one has not increased in the slightest. The greatest sales for insurance for damage caused by an earthquake, a flood or another natural disaster happens just after that natural disaster has hit a region and then it gradually declines, until the event is a distant memory. The risk of a tailings pond break at a mine in B.C. is no higher or lower than it was a week ago (in fact, it's probably lower because the other mining companies likely dispatched engineers to their tailing ponds to check them out) but now people are talking about it so the risk must be greater. The proper question should be "when was the last time there was a catastrophic, disastrous tailings pond spill in B.C.?" Can't remember? That speaks to how often it happens. Environmental activists demanding better oversight and full reviews of industry accidents, particularly in connection to tailings ponds and pipelines, use the same line of logic the U.S. government has used to justify the war on terrorism. This horrible but rare event has happened (a terrorism attack on U.S. soil, a massive spill of a tailings pond or a pipeline) and only a complete overreaction of people, money and time has the possibility of preventing it from happening again. That's not to say that a review of the Mount Polley spill shouldn't happen to explore ways to prevent future mishaps but the best practice is the best practice, which may or may not involve hiring thousands of bureaucrats and imposing tougher regulations and fines against industry. Answers and rational decisions going forward is what's needed, not frightening words and emotional reactions from the gut.
