Brazilian miner and iron ore producer Vale was the only company ordered to make corrective dam measures following an audit by Minas Gerais state prosecutors, the state’s government and its environmental regulator.
The audit also included Brazilian Minérios Nacional SA, and steelmaker ArcelorMittal Brazil. MPMG, a body of Minas Gerais state prosecutors, said the companies presented a report indicating the state of their dams, following a government order, as reported by SteelOrbis.
Most Brazilian iron ore producers and steelmakers were affected by intense rainfall in December and January this year, which forced them to provisionally halt iron ore activities. Those included flats steelmaker Usiminas, Companhia Siderurgica Nacional, Vallourec Brazil, Gerdau and Vale.
Prosecutors said this week 18 dams out of 32 presented issues that must be fixed. All of them belong to Vale. The company will have a 10-day period, counted from January 19, 2022, to present a technical and photographic report followed by a technical responsibility annotation (ART) report, indicating which measures the company executed to address the issues.
Prosecutors said Vale will have to comply with several specific terms. As such, Vale was ordered to mitigate and fix erosive processes around its dams, perform maintenance, and cleanse the dam’s internal draining systems, among other tasks.
Other 13 dams analyzed by prosecutors, the Minas Gerais state and its state environment regulator, did not present issues that needed fixing.