DanihelkaRISK ANALYSIS OF TAILING DAMS F

TAILING DAMS
RISK ANALYSIS AND MANAGMENT
Pavel Danihelka
Eva Červeňanová
UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE
REVAN, November 2007
CONTENT:
• Examples of historical accidents

• Introduction to risk theory
• Risk analysis principles
• Basics of application of risk analysis
to tailing dams safety
• Conclusion
UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, Y

EREVAN, November 2007
EXAMPLES OF HISTORICAL
ACCIDENTS
At least 221 serious tailing dams accidents
reported by UNEP*:
Mine name/ Incident Impact

Location Date
Baia Mare, 30.01.2000 100,000 m3 cyanide contaminated water with
Romania some tailings released
Baia Borsa, 10.03.2000 22,000 t of tailings contaminated by heavy
Romania metals released
Merriespruit, 22.02.1994 17 deaths, 500,000 m3 slurry flowed 2 km
South Africa
* http://www.mineralresourcesforum.org/docs/pdfs/Bulletin121.PDF

Major tailing dams review – cont.
Mine name/ Incident Impact

Location Date
Buffalo Creek, 26.02.1972 125 deaths, 500 homes destroyed
USA
Mufilira, 25.09.1970 89 deaths, 68,000 m3 into mine workings
Zambia
Omai, Guyana 19.08.1995 4.2 million m3 cyanide slurry released
Placer, 02.09.1995 12 deaths, 50,000 m3 released
Philippines
Los Frailes, 24.04.1998 released 4-5 million cubic meters of toxic
Spain tailings slurries
Stava, Italy 19.07.1985 269 deaths, tailings flowed up to 8 km
Aitik mine, 09.08.2000 1.8 million m3 water released
Sweden

History of major tailing dams accidents
Source: „ICOLD Bulletin 121“

Case study:
BAIA MARE
January 30, 2000 in Baia Mare (Romania)
the biggest freshwater disaster in Central
and Eastern Europe.
Nearly 100,000 m3 of cyanide and heavy
metal-contamined liquid spilled into the
Lupus stream, reaching the Szamos,
Tisza, and finally Danube rivers and
killing hundreds of tones of fish and
poisoning the drinking water of more than
2 million people in Hungary.

LOS FRAILES
April 25, 1998
tailings dam failure of the Los Frailes
lead-zinc mine at Aznalcóllar near
Seville, Spain,
released 4-5 million cubic meters of
toxic tailings slurries and liquid into
nearby Río Agrio, a tributary to Río
Guadiamar.
The slurry wave covered several
thousand hectares of farmland, and it
threatens the Doñana National Park, a
UN World Heritage Area.

STAVA
On July 19, 1985, a fluorite
tailings dam of Prealpi
Mineraia failed at Stava,
Trento, Italy. 200,000 m3 of
tailings flowed 4.2 km
downstream at a speed of
up to 90 km/h, killing 268
people and destroying 62
buildings. The total surface
area affected was 43.5
hectares.

AITIK
On September 8, 2000, the
tailings dam of Boliden's Aitik
copper mine near Gällivare in
northern Sweden failed over a
length of 120 meters. This
resulted in the spill of 2.5
million cubic meters of liquid
into an adjacent settling pond.
Boliden subsequently released
1.5 million cubic meters of
water from the settling pond
into the environment to secure
the stability of the settling pond.

VARIABILITY OF CAUSES OF
ACCIDENT
• Inadequate management
• Lack of control of hydrological system
• Error in site selection and investigation
• Unsatisfactory foundation, lack of stability of
downstream slope
• Seepage
• Overtoping
• Earthquake
MAIN ROOT CAUSE:

RISK ANALYSIS AND MANAGEMENT NEGLECTED
Distribution of causes of tailing dams accidents
Source: ICOLD Bulletin 121

VARIABILITY OF CONSEQUENCES
• Flooding, wave of slurry
• Contamination of surface water, living organisms
(biota), intoxication
• Drinking and irrigation water contamination
(surface)
• Drinking and irrigation water (underground)
contamination
• Soil contamination
• As consequence of 2),3),4)ad.5 : Food chain
contamination
» FREQUENTLY TRANSBOUNDARY EFFECT
Conclusion:
• Tailing dam is a risky installation able to
cause major accident and so we have to
treat it as major risk

2. INTRODUCTION TO RISK THEORY
• Definition of
– Hazard
– Risk
• Risk and its quantification (measurement)
• Principles of risk reduction/management

DEFINITION OF TERMS
SOURCE OF DANGER
=
POTENTIAL TO CAUSE
DAMAGE

RISK
=
PROBABILITY x GRAVITY
OF ACCIDENT (EVENT)

RISK
DANGEROUSITY
IDENTICAL
RISK
DIFFERENT
DIFFERENCE: MANAGEMENT OF RISK

FLUX OF DANGER
Initial Other
event conditions
Flux of danger
Source Target
system system
DOMINO EFFECT:
SYSTEM 2 SYSTEM 3
INITIAL SYSTEM 1
EVENT
Example: Stava accident

CATASTROPHE

• Flux of danger: • Targets system:
 Movement of  Population around tailings dam
material
 Environment
 Flux of energy
 Flux of • Surface water
information • Underground water
• Soil
• Living organisms
 Material and financial losses
(direct)
 Functioning of enterprise
(including indirect losses)
• Sources of danger:
– Having potential (energy) to cause damage
– Having potential to weaken structure, resistance,
resilience of our system (tailing dam and its
environment)
• Direct to dam stability
• Indirect including human error
• To consequences

QUANTIFICATION OF RISK
• RISK MATRIX B C
A – banal case PROBABILITY
B – frequent accident with low

consequences (minor injury,
small contamination, ...)
C – disaster with high probability
(walking in minefield)
D – disaster with low probability
(nuclear power plant, major A D
incident)
GRAVITY
• Acceptability of risk
NON ACCEPTABLE
ACTION
PROBABILITY
NECESSARY
ACCEPTABLE RISK
MITIGATION
ACTION
VOLUNTARY CONDITIONALLY
ACCEPTABLE
GRAVITY

ACCEPTABILITY OF RISK
• Decision is socio-politic, not scientific

• Decision should include all stakeholders
• All types of risk should be evaluation
together

How to decrease risk?

RISK ANALYSIS PROCESS
Selection of Feedback and
sources of control
danger
Scenarios
proposal
Risk assessment
Goals
setting
Barriers of
prevention
ETA Risk management

FTA
AMDEC
FMEA IMPACT
HAZOP
Residual risk
WHAT-IF PROBALITY
Etc.
TECHNICAL ORGANISATION BARIERS

BARRIERS

SOURCES OF DANGER
 Direct to dam stability:
• Active environment (rain, snow, freeze…)
• Earthquake
• Geological conditions
• Domino effect
 Indirect to dam (including human error):
• Wrong conception
• Construction failure
• Material failure
• Bad maintenance
• Lack of control
 To consequence:
• Water and sludge movement
• Mechanical contamination by solid particles
• Chemical toxicity / ecotoxicity
• Radioactivity

SCENARIO PROPOSAL
• All plausible scenario should be involved in

preliminary conspiration
• All stages of life-time must be considered
• Those having minor impact omitted
• Similar combined to groups
• Described as combination of events in time
• Finally, we are able to compare limited number
of scenarios only

TOOLS HELPING TO DEFINE
SCENARIO
• Examples of past accidents
• Near-misses and accidents on site
• Control list
• WHAT-IF
• ETA
• FTA
• AMDEC
• FMEA
• HAZOP
• Etc.
Past accidents analysis
• In site – during all life of it
• In similar places you operate, including
near-misses. Mind the necessity of
reporting.
• In mine industry generally
– TAILINGS DAMS, RISK OF DANGEROUS OCCURRENCES, Lessons
learnt from practical experiences, ICOLD- UNEP 2001, Bulletin 121,
ISSN 0534-8293
– APELL for Mining: Guidance for the Mining Industry in Raising
Awareness and Preparedness for Emergencies at Local Level,
Technical report No. 41, UN Publications 2001, ISBN 92-807-2035

SCENARIO DESCRIPTION
CAUSES CONSEQUENCES
1
„TOP“
EVENT 3
(DAM
DESTRUCTION)
5
7
SCENARIO 1
SCENARIO 2
EACH SCENARIO NUMBERED

RISK ASSESMENT:
• FREQUENCY x CONSEQUENCES (IMPACT)

FREQUENCY:
•From past accidents (high degree of uncertainty)
•From initial events frequency and FTA by boolean algebra
•Avoid omitting of low frequency events (not to limit only to
100-year water or earthquake)
•Human factor extremely important

Frequency of „100 year“ flooding

One mythus:
„We operate it long time without accident, so safety is
prooved“

CONSEQUENCES:
• Consequences to human lives, health and well

being. Evaluation of consequences with stakeholders
necessary
• Direct costs (remediation, compensation, ...)
• Social disturbance
• Consequence to environment – short time and
long time impacts
• Economical consequences and operability
• Indirect costs

Costs of Failure
Physical failure: recent large failures $30 to $100 million
in direct costs
Environmental failure: some recent clean-up liabilities to
several $100’s of millions
Closure liability: some recent examples in $ 500 milon to
$ 4 billion range
Industry/investor impacts: Shareholder value losses and
industry imposed constraints and costs amounting to
many billions of dollars

CONSEQUENCES II:
• The scales of consequences should be defined

before analysis is done (4-6 grades)
• All possible targets should have the same scales
of consequences (e.g. Grade X is comparable in all
target systems)
• The most serious consequence is selected
• Internal values of society/enterprise become to
be clarified

Severity of impact – an example
(source: Robertson GeoConsultants Inc.)
Consequences Severity Biological Impacts Regulatory Impacts and Public Concern and Image Health and Safety
(Direct Costs) and Land Use Concerns
Extreme (>$10 M) Catastrophic impact Unable to meet regulatory Local, international and NGO Fatality or multiple fatalities
on habitat obligations or expectations; shut outcry and demonstrations, results expected
(irreversable and down or severe restriction of in large stock devaluation: severe
large) operations restrictions of 'licence to practice';
High ($1 - $10 M) Significant, Regularly (more than once per Local, international or NGO Severe injury or disability likely:
irreversible impact year) or severely fail regulatory activism resulting in political and or some potential for fatality
on habitat or large, obligations or expectations - financial impacts on company
reversable large increasing fines and loss of 'license to do business' and in
regulatory trust major proceedure or practice
changes,
Moderate ($0.1 - $1 M) Significant, Occasionally (less than one per Occasional local, international Lost time or injury likely: or
reversible impact on year) or moderately fail and NGO attention requiring some potential for serious
habitat regulatory obligations or minor proceedure changes and injuries; or small risk of fatality.
expectations - fined or censured additional public relations and
communications
Low ($0.01 - 0.1 M) Minor impact on Seldom or marginally exceed Infrequent local, international and First aid required; or small risk
habitat regulatory obligations or NGO attention addressed by of serious injury.
expectations. Some loss of normal public relations and
regulatory tolerance, increasing communications
reporting.
Negligible (<$0.01 M) No measurable Do not exceed regulatory No international/ NGO attention No concern
impact obligations or expectations

RISK ASSESSMENT
Following frequency and gravity, scenarios
are put to the risk matrix
1 5
PROBABILITY
3 7
GRAVITY

GOALS SETTING:
Non-axeptable (red zone) scenarios: immediate action
Conditionally acceptable (yellow zone) scenatios: action envisaged
1 5
PROBABILITY
1
5 2
3 2 7
6 7
GRAVITY

BARIERS OF PREVENTION / PROTECTION
Initial Other
event conditions
Flux of danger
Source Target
BARRIER BARRIER
system system
REMOTION OF SOURCE BARRIER PROTECTION OF TARGET
SYSTEM 2 SYSTEM 3
INITIAL SYSTEM 1
EVENT
BARRIER OF FLUX DOMINO EFFECT

CATASTROPHE

SAFETY MANAGEMENT
• Prevention part (even three part of bow-tie
diagram)
• Emergency preparedness

NEAR MISSES:
„HUNTING FOR DEVIATIONS“
ELIMINATED
CATASTROPHE
BIG ACCIDENTS / LOSSES
SMALL ACCIDENTS/ LOSSES
DEVIATIONS

Emergency preparedness
• Preparedness to accident, even with low
probability
• Training and not only desktop one
• Information of all potentially involved
• Crisis management including training
• Open and honest communication with
municipalities, emergency response
teams, government bodies (inspection…)
• Communication with media
RECOMMENDATIONS
1) Detailed site investigation by experienced geologists and geotechnical
engineers to determine possible potential for failure, with in situ and
laboratory testing to determine the properties of the foundation
materials.
2) Application of state of the art procedures for design.
3) Expert construction supervision and inspection.
4) Laboratory testing for “as built” conditions.
5) Routine monitoring.
6) Safety evaluation for observed conditions including “as built” geometry,
materials and shearing resistance. Observations and effects of
piezometric conditions.
7) Dam break studies.
8) Contingency plans.
9) Periodic safety audits

And something for thinking…

DO WE REALLY NEED ACCIDENT
PREVENTION?
• You've carefully thought out all the angles.

• You've done it a thousand times.
• It comes naturally to you.
• You know what you're doing, its what
you've been trained to do your whole life.
• Nothing could possibly go wrong, right ?

THINK AGAIN!

THINK AGAIN!

• Thank you for your attention !


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TAILING DAMS

RISK ANALYSIS AND MANAGMENT

• Examples of historical accidents

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, Y

Mine name/ Incident Impact

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

Mine name/ Incident Impact

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

Source: „ICOLD Bulletin 121“

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

MAIN ROOT CAUSE:

Source: ICOLD Bulletin 121

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

DIFFERENCE: MANAGEMENT OF RISK

Example: Stava accident

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

B – frequent accident with low

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

• Decision is socio-politic, not scientific

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

ETA Risk management

TECHNICAL ORGANISATION BARIERS

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

• All plausible scenario should be involved in

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

EACH SCENARIO NUMBERED

• FREQUENCY x CONSEQUENCES (IMPACT)

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

• Consequences to human lives, health and well

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

• The scales of consequences should be defined

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

REMOTION OF SOURCE BARRIER PROTECTION OF TARGET

BARRIER OF FLUX DOMINO EFFECT

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

BIG ACCIDENTS / LOSSES

SMALL ACCIDENTS/ LOSSES

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

• You've carefully thought out all the angles.

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE

UNECE WORSHOP ON TDS, YE