Seabridge Gold’s Brent Murphy wrote a letter to Stephanie Wood reporter at The Narwhal and Chris Sergeant, Research scientist at the University of Montana correcting incorrect information about the Selenium Removal Technology adopted at KSM Project that was published in the article titled ‘Seabridge Gold asks B.C. for more time to begin KSM mine construction, citing COVID-19’.
In the Narwhal article, Chris Sergeant was quoted as saying “Water that contacts the mine on the Unuk River side will drain directly into a water storage reservoir. This water would receive treatment before discharge into the Unuk watershed. But there isn’t currently a proven method for sufficient removal of selenium — which has been shown to negatively impact fish populations — and mine operations are expected to increase selenium levels in the water.” This statement is incorrect.
In 2015, Seabridge successfully completed a pilot plant evaluation of a new process for the removal of selenium from waters in northwest BC. The pilot plant was constructed and operated by independent BioteQ Environmental Technologies, Inc. using their Selen-IX™ treatment technology. This selenium treatment technology was able to reduce selenium concentrations to 1 ppb in water extracted from the KSM project site and thus, satisfied a key legally binding condition of the BC Environmental Assessment Certificate which Seabridge received for the KSM Project on July 30, 2014. The KSM Se treatment information was shared with the public in 2015. In 2018, the Selen-IX™ treatment technology was issued a US patent further validating Seabridge Gold’s chosen approach for selenium treatment at the KSM Project.
Read our letter to Stephanie Wood reporter at The Narwhal
Read our letter to Chris Sergeant, Research scientist at the University of Montana