Five months after the prefect of Côtes d'Armor authorized the opening of a new pit in the mine of the Imérys company, in Glomel, the controversy surrounding this project is rising a notch. Supported by the municipal majority and some of the residents, the andalusite extraction activity is accused of polluting water and soil by other residents and by environmental associations. The latter are demonstrating this Saturday, November 23, near the mine site.
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The surroundings of Glomel have something to surprise the visitor who discovers this region of central Brittany. Protected moors and marshes in a small regional nature reserve, Natura 2000 classified sites… and an open-air mine, operated since 1972 and considered the largest in activity in France.
To read. The survey from our partner Splann! The Imerys mine contaminates the Glomel nature reserve
The multinational company Imérys, which took over and developed the mine in 2012, extracts andalusite from the Glomel rock: up to 1.5 million tonnes of excavated rocks, to extract between 65,000 and 75,000 tonnes of andalusite per year.
Because of its resistance to high temperatures, this Ore, incorporated into concrete or paint, is mainly used to make tanks and furnaces for metallurgical factories and nuclear power plants. The Glomel site alone provides a fifth of the world's andalusite production. The few other andalusite mines are located in South Africa and Peru.
For the multinational Imérys, the digging of a 4th extraction pit is strategic, the others being announced as exhausted within ten years.
Read: the survey by our partner Splann! In Glomel, a silver mine for the multinational Imerys
But some residents of Glomel fear that the impact study provided by the industrialist to the Côtes-d'Armor prefecture has neglected certain aspects of its releases into the environment. A suspicion that is fueled by Slpann's investigation!
In the distance to the left, a “pour”, one of the embankments around thirty meters high where the Imérys company rejects the excavated rocks
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© F Malésieux – FTV
To read. In Glomel, the career of discord
The journalists thus discovered that for the analysis of a watercourse near the mine, the nicer “the most toxic metals emitted by the site do not appear to have been sought.” Based on their own samples, taken at several points around the mine, the investigation site discovered that “Nickel concentrations are up to 60 times higher than the guideline value for good ecological status of freshwater sediments. Cobalt concentrations are up to 20 times higher than this value. Analyzes also reveal the presence of toxic metals that Imerys is not supposed to dump: the sediments contain four times the guideline value for arsenic and an abnormal content of cadmium, both of which are also carcinogenic, mutagenic and reprotoxic.”
The authorization granted to the mine was given on the basis of a very insufficient impact study, which ignores very very serious pollution, and when I say pollution, I am being kind, we can rather talk about intoxication or poisoning.
Jean-Yves Jégo
Douar Bev Association and member of the “Mines de rien” Collective
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The Water and Rivers of Brittany association filed a contentious appeal on October 21, considering that the drinking water catchments near Glomel are threatened.
To raise awareness among the population, a demonstration took place near the mine, at the call, in particular, of the Uprisings of the Earth Mervent (southern Brittany), the UDB (Breton Democratic Union) Kreiz Breizh, and Europe ecology Brittany greens. The mobilization brought together around 150 people.
