The main environmental organizations reject the reopening of the Aznalcóllar mine

This April 25, 27 years of breakage of the sludge raft of the Boliden mine, in Aznalcóllar (Seville), which caused the largest environmental catastrophe in Andalusia to date, flooding the Guadiamar river basin with more than six million cubic meters of toxic sludge, putting at risk due to extreme pollution to doñana. For months much of these toxic sludge were collected and deposited in the so -called Aznalcóllar short, where they are maintained to date. BOLIDEN, the company that managed the mine, never took care of the costs of these cleaning operations.

On this anniversary, Friends of the Earth, Ecologists in Action, Greenpeace, SEO/Birdlife and WWF show their rejection of the reopening project of the Aznalcóllar mine, whose mining rights the Junta de Andalucía granted in February 2015 the Los Frailes mining company, participated in 97% by the multinational Group Mexico.

Last July 2024, the competent Ministry granted environmental authorization to the Los Frailes Minera underground project, for extraction and for an industrial plant to obtain zinc concentrates, copper and lead, during an operational period of 17 years. But to date, the mining authorization under the General Directorate of Mines, nor the Water Concession of the Guadalquivir Hydrographic Confederation has not yet been granted.

The environmental organizations denounce, relying on studies carried out by the University of Seville and in the performance of the Andalusian Ombudsman, that the environmental authorization of the project has not taken into account all the environmental and socio -economic impacts of the implementation and execution of the mining exploitation on protected areas such as the low Guadalquivir, included in the Natura 2000 network, and the natural space of Doñana.

Environmental authorization includes a discharge of 85,520 million liters of toxic waters in the Guadalquivir River as it passes through the city of Seville. This discharge would include the complete emptying of the friars’ short (15,000 million liters) and the partial emptying of the aznalcóllar cut (2,520 million liters), of very polluted acid waters, during a first phase of 18 months, and a subsequent continuous discharge of 4,000 million liters per year for 17 years in the operating phase of mining exploitation.

This discharge would seriously contaminate the river with heavy metals such as arsenic, cadmium, lead, zinc, nickel and selenium, from Seville to the mouth in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, seriously affecting the rice crops of the Sevillian marsh and the fishing reserve of the mouth of the Guadalquivir, which would also put at risk the health of the people who consume these products.

On April 9, several mayors and mayors and representatives of farmers, fishermen and shellf miners

Neither the project of the mining company nor the environmental authorities have taken into account the cumulative and synergistic effects of these new discharges with the effects of other discharges that have already occurred or that have been authorized in the same area. Thus, the combined effect of the discharges that the Copper Mine Las Cruces has been producing in the same area between 2009 and 2023 has not been contemplated, whose ecotoxicity has already been accredited. The reopening of this mine has already received authorization for new mining spills during the next 14 years of underground exploitation. The cumulative effects of these discharges have not been taken into account despite taking place in the same area of ​​special conservation (ZEC), which would breach the minimum legally established for an environmental impact study. Impact evaluations have also ignored the complex hydrodynamic and physicochemical context of the Guadalquivir estuary. These issues are collected in the study carried out a year ago by the Professor of Ecology at the University of Seville, Jesús Castillo, who recommends, in application of the precautionary principle and the principle of non-deterioration of the Water Framework Directive, not making new mining discharges to this protected area.

According to environmental organizations, the Junta de Andalucía has not also evaluated the environmental condition of toxic discharge in the natural space of Doñana, and has prevented the Doñana Natural Space Council[1].

Finally, the public tender that resolved the award of mining rights to Los Frailes in 2015 is in question and is currently a judicial process in its final phase. After 10 years of judicial instruction, the oral trial at the Provincial Court of Seville began last March 3.

The result of this trial could eventually derive in the nullity of the award of mining rights to Los Frailes, and consequently the illegality of environmental authorizations, mining and in waters that are currently being processed for this company could be deduced.

Taking into account all of the above, environmental organizations demand:

The provisional suspension of the processing of the authorizations currently in process until the resolution of the oral trial that is followed in relation to the process of awarding mining rights to Los Frailes, in line with the principles of precaution and caution.

The creation, prior to the final mining authorization, of a commission of independent technical and scientific experts, following the proposal of the Andalusian Ombudsman, in order to determine if there is sufficient certainty about the risks derived from the discharge or the application of the principles of precaution and caution is necessary.

A pronouncement by the agencies dependent on the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge on the possible incidence of the discharges provided for in compliance with the objectives by 2027 of the good state of the waters of the Guadalquivir estuary agreed with the European Union, also in line with the requested by the Andalusian Ombudsman.

The rupture of the Aznalcóllar raft in 1998 covered 4,634 hectares of toxic sludge, contaminated 60 kilometers of Guadiamar channel and cost more than 240 million public euros to clean its effects. «That disaster is still alive in the memory of Andalusia. Today, at the gates of repeating history, we must remember that the Guadalquivir River is not just a river route, it is the backbone of the identity of Andalusia. And Doñana, declared World Heritage and Biosphere Reserve, is a symbol of Andalusia and Spain. The Andalusian government should not fail again. Applying the precautionary principle is not to stop development: it is to avoid another irreparable damage, ”emphasizes environmental organizations.