Certeju de Sus is an old mining centre in Hunedoara county, located in the south-eastern area of Metaliferi Mountains. The place lies within the Golden Quadrilateral of Apuseni Mountains. The gold mining project of Certej is owned 80% by the Canadian company Eldorado Gold and less than 20% by the Romanian state. For its features – the devastating impact on the environment, the legal flaws, the network of shareholders, i.e. the holding companies, the project operating in Certej is similar to the one proposed in Roşia Montană, attracting over time serious criticism by the environmental protection organizations in Romania. Since 2008, the local community started to show opposition to the project. The mining company intended to build two tailings dams, one of which for cyanide oxidation, on Frumoasei Valley within the Balşa commune. 102 local people and land owners in Voia, signed a memorandum against cyanide mining. The company had to change the location of their tailings management facilities (TMF). In December 2011 Eldorado Gold initiated the takeover of European Goldfields for the amount of 2.5 billion dollars. The acquisition was completed in February 2012. Eldorado Gold became thus the majority shareholder of the Deva Gold joint stock company. Eldorado Gold Corporation is a Canadian low-cost murky mining company listed on the Vancouver stock exchange, which holds mining perimeters in Greece, Romania, Turkey, China and Brazil. On 5 July 2012 the Regional Environmental Protection Agency in Timişoara (EPA) issued the environmental permit no. 8 for the mining of gold-silver ores in the Certej perimeter. Although the Regional EPA in Timişoara is subordinated to the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MMSC), the minister of environment, Rovana Plumb, maintained that she only learned about the issuance of this environmental agreement at the beginning of September. In issuing the environmental permit for the Certej project, the authorities found as acceptable the impacts of 29 million cubic meters of water consumption from the Mureş River, the deforestation of 187 hectares of forest and overlapping of the mining project with the Natura 2000 – 0132 ROSPA Ore Mountains site over an area of 108 hectares. Due to public contestations and outrage among the Romanian public, the Environmental Protection Agency in Hunedoara requested additional biodiversity impacts report that however resulted in a new environmental permit issued in November 2013. Considering that the new document illegally replaced and revised the environmental permit issued by the Regional Environmental Protection Agency Timişoara in 2012, Mining Watch Romania decided to dispute the new act in administrative due process. The recent update in the environmental approval process mainly referred to the fact that the mining site is partially included in a nature site, Natura 2000 ROSPA 0132 Munții Metaliferi. Around 108 hectares of the mining site are part of the 26,600 hectares natural site, which, according to Mining Watch, was already known and included in the original paperworks to get the approval. What was lacking, however, was a study from the site owners on the impact of the mine on the larger natural site, something that should have been required to get the approval. |