Richard Ness : Trial Log : Court Hearing #23 on 5 May 2006

Court Hearing #23 on 5 May 2006 - 05 May 2006
by Eric



David Sompie

I accept this witnesses testimony in its entirety:

This witnesses testimony highlighted many aspects of PT NMR’s operation that are very relevant to this case, including; testimony which confirmed that PT NMR utilized competent experts to conduct feasibility and environmental bases line analysis and that it received Government approval for both the Amdal and Feasibility Studies, after which the Government granted a construction permit to build the mine and further granted a permit to operate the mine after construction was complete.

From this witnesses testimony it is clear that environmental management was built into the process design and incorporated many safe guards such as tailings detox and mercury scrubbers into the process.

That PT NMR constantly monitored the environment and reported the monitoring results to the Government as well as sought and received approvals for annual work plans through out the life of the mine. It was noted from the witnesses testimony that the quality of marine environment was well with regulatory limits.

It was also noted that PT NMR as a responsible operator conducted several toxicity tests on it’s mine tailings even though those tests were not a regulatory requirement which constantly showed that mine tailings did not meet the criteria of hazardous waste. These same tests were also conducted by the provincial government and PT NMR was advised by the government that mine tailings were not a hazardous waste.

The witness confirmed that PT NMR did comply with a government request to conduct a Ecological Risk Assessment study in the 6 month allocated time frame even though there was no regulatory requirement to do so.

The witness stated that PT NMR did receive a permit to discharge it’s mine tailings and since the issuance of that permit, no correspondence had been received which indicated that the permit was revoked by the government.

The witness also emphasized the role of the Kepela Teknik in mine operations which included the need to take preventive measures against the possibility of environmental damage and for the Kepela Teknik to take immediate measures should the mining activity pose any risk to the environment. Through out the life of the mine, the Kepela Teknik indeed did act responsibly and take appropriate measures including mine shut down when problems with the tailings pipe did occur.



Jerry Kojansouw

I accept this witnesses testimony in its entirety.

This witness confirmed that PT NMR acted responsibly in being a good steward in monitoring the marine environment, including water, fish and coral reefs. The witness highlighted that during the life of the mine and during post closure monitoring, that the monitoring result showed no decrease in quality of marine life or function in Buyat Bay.

Of extreme relevance to this case was this fact witness observed and participated in the police sampling of the marine environments of Buyat & Totok Bays as well as other locations within the mine area. That split samples were taken with the police on both sea and fresh water as well as other reference materials including fish and mine tailings, and these samples were properly preserved and sent to an accredited and independent laboratory for analysis. In the case of PT NMR, one time use bottles with an automatic tamper proof seal.

This witness also stated that he observed that the police did not use tamper proof sealed containers and that some of these samples were stored, unsealed on the floor of the Ratatotok police station for up to four days. It was also noted that there are many discrepancies within the BAP between what samples were collected in the field and what were received at the National Police Laboratory, surprisingly more samples were delivered to the police laboratory the were actually collected. The “chain of custody and control” of the samples was again in question, which when combined with the high discrepancy or variance between the field and the laboratory calls into question the accuracy of the results, especially as it relates to both sea and fresh water.

The witness did state that sea water results received from the police laboratory do not correlate with the split samples from the independent accredited laboratory nor do they correlate with any other independent sampling or PT NMR’s life of mine and post closure sampling results.