EPA slaps Rubis with $1M fine for role in fuel spill at Karouni Mine

Apr 16, 2020 News

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has slapped Rubis Guyana Inc. with a $1,066,000 fine for its role in a fuel spill that took place at the Karouni which is operated by Troy Resources Guyana Inc. This was confirmed yesterday by EPA Head, Dr. Vincent Adams.

EPA Head, Dr. Vincent Adams

During an interview with Kaieteur News, Dr. Adams said, “Troy Resources as you know, was fined for $1M for the fuel spill, but in a subsequent report they submitted, they threw some of the blame on Rubis, and showed how they were at fault too. So the law allows us to hold both parties liable.”
The official said too that just recently, he received a report of a slope collapsing at the Troy operations but noted that there was no fatality. Be that as it may, Dr. Adams said he remains terribly concerned about the state of affairs at the operations while noting that he does not get the impression that the Australian company is serious about safety.
“Even though there was no fatality, we are very concerned and will do a detailed inspection of the site as soon as is practical because these things do raise a lot of red flags with us. I am getting the impression that safety is not of the highest priority,” the official said.
In a previous interview, the EPA Head said that the fuel spill at the Karouni Mine was a sheer case of recklessness.
In explaining the chain of events that took place, Dr. Adams said, “It was supposed to be a transfer of fuel into a storage tank. The fuel comes in for them to use and they put it into a tank and when the tank gets full, there is an actuator which shuts off the flow into the tank when it is full but that was not operational and it overflowed.”
The EPA head added, “Then there is a pipe for emergency that leads out of the secondary containment area that they have to receive the fuel. That pipe was supposed to have a valve on it but it was missing.”
Dr. Adams had said that based on telephone conversations with company officials, they were not even aware that the valve went missing. Further to this, Dr. Adams had said that there is normally supposed to be an experienced person overseeing such operations. “But there was no one overlooking and it had to be running for hours for 5000 litres to escape. It means nobody was paying attention. These are the things that could cause fires, explosions and even death. So it was a case of sheer recklessness,” the EPA official had said.
Dr. Adams had also expressed concern that Troy Resources’ operations was being conducted in this manner when just a few months ago, it was forced to suspend works following the death of its geologist, Ryan Taylor.
When Taylor passed away, Troy Resources told the Guyanese public, via a paid advertisement in November last, that it would make every effort to improve its worker’s safety practices. The company said too that all employees would be retrained in the basics of safety before returning to the pit.
Considering this, Dr. Adams had said, “So imagine my dismay after hearing that they were not sure when one of the valves went missing. They said it could have been missing during the time it had shut down operations following Taylor’s death. Now how you can start up and not check to ensure everything is in place? It leaves one to question what else is not there that could cause a higher safety risk.”

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