With a focus on safe and responsible operations, Codelco El Teniente Division adopted a demanding international standard for the management of its tailings and last year complied with more than 70 requirements established by the norm.

This is the Global Standard on Tailings Management for the mining industry (GISTM), a process that resulted from the Global Tailings Review, convened in 2019 by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI) and the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM).

“This standard is divided into six major topics, which include the 77 requirements that, as a division, in our four warehouses, Carén, Barahona, Colihues and Cauquenes, we met in 2023,” explains Omar Medina, Development Director of Carén, Codelco El Teniente Division.

“Chile, being a seismic country, already has strict regulations, so our great challenge and commitment to adhere to this standard was in the information and communication with the communities, which we saw reflected in an emergency drill that we carried out and that was a very important step,” he points out.

Areas of review

The six main themes addressed by the GISTM address Affected Communities; Integrated Knowledge Base; Tailings Facility Design, Construction, Operation and Monitoring; Management and Governance; Emergency Response and Long-Term Recovery; and Public Disclosure and Access to Information.

“When this initiative was born, Codelco quickly got involved at a corporate level and provided the roadmap for work in the divisions. The applicable requirements, documents, good practice guides that complemented the standard and compliance protocols were determined,” explains Francisco Saldaña, specialist engineer at the El Teniente Dams, Tailings and Water Resources Management.

Thus, in 2021, the first diagnoses were carried out, which led to a series of action plans, evaluations and progress control meetings over the following two years, with significant increases in the indicators. “The idea was to be demanding both with our operations and with the consultants who came to visit us, to go beyond compliance,” says Saldaña.

Along these lines, the Carén Development Director asserts that “the work today is to maintain this standard. We also have challenges ahead that involve this permanent communication with the communities, going into detail about emergency and recovery plans and learning from activities such as the one we carried out last year, an emergency simulation in the Carén Reservoir sector,” together with authorities and institutions such as the National Disaster Response Prevention Service (Senapred) and coordination with the Community Development Directorate, the Sustainability and External Affairs Management of Codelco El Teniente Division.

“Operating under these standards, under this global seal to which we subscribe in our way of working, is ultimately a reflection that our operations are safe. It is support for communities so that they can be calm and maintain their trust in us, because we are always seeking continuous improvement,” he adds.

Saldaña adds: “This allows us to give people assurances that the deposits are working in accordance with the best international practices regarding tailings management.”

This standard also includes periodic reviews and maintenance, the instrumentation of tailings to maintain online records of their activities and levels, and checks such as the one carried out annually by the Independent Tailings Review Board (ITRB), made up of international experts.

The manager of El Teniente's Dams, Tailings and Water Resources, Germán Sandoval, highlighted that these efforts are part of "the strategy that our division is promoting, which has to do with triple value, where the focus is not only on the economic, but also on the environmental and social. Making our operations safe for workers, communities and the environment is part of our mandate."