Alcoa was fined $400,000 plus $5536 in costs in the Rockingham Magistrates Court on Tuesday over the incident,which took place in 2022.
The utility claimed other agencies tasked with approving Alcoa’s mining activities had been instructed to put social and economic factors above water source protection.
The ban could see 7000 jobs from Alcoa and South32’s operations impacted.
A ground-breaking international research team casts a fresh light on the US giant’s aims and activities in Western Australia,and exposes some sobering truths.
The West Australian government,and sections of our media,are presenting a false picture of what WA voters want to the rest of the country.
Alcoa is storing enough caustic bauxite residue to fill Optus Stadium more than 350 times in areas south of Perth that have failed to be certified as stable.
The burden of enforcing special arrangements to allow Alcoa to keep mining bauxite has forced WA’s environment regulator to severely cut its efforts to protect nature throughout the rest of the state.
The Environmental Protection Authority has warned Alcoa to provide the information it needs on time,or risk stricter conditions on its mining in WA forests.
Water Corporation concluded that contamination of Perth’s dams is “certain” but the state government heavily watered-down its recommendations to reduce the risks from bauxite mining.
Alcoa’s funding will support a forest research centre for five years and will also boost its own team of environmental researchers from four to eleven.