JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) - South Africa has appointed an InterMinisterial Committee (IMC) to address the acid mine drainage (AMD) issue in the Western and Central basins of the Witwatersrand, Water and Environmental Affairs Minister Buyelwa Sonjica said on Monday.

The IMC, which held its first meeting last week, has appointed a team of experts to compile a report on the extent of the problem, within six weeks.

The report would be taken to Cabinet, which would decide what remedies should be implemented and where the money should come from to deal with the AMD, which is a legacy of 120 years of mining in the area.

Sonjica, Mineral Resources Minister Susan Shabangu, National Planning Commission Minister Trevor Manuel, Science and Technology Minister Naledi Pandor and Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan serve on the IMC.

The panel of experts tasked with compiling a report to assess the risk, was made up of individuals from the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research, the Water Research Council, the Council for Geoscience, the Chamber of Mines, as well as the Department of Water and Environmental Affairs and the Department of Mineral Resources.

In addition to appraising the AMD risk, the experts would assess what various institutions have done, and consider available solutions and technology. The IMC would then interrogate the viability and costs of critical short-term interventions, integrate lasting and sustainable medium- and long-term solutions and explore possible partnerships with the private sector.

AMD was already decanting in the Western basin at a rate of 20-million litres (Ml) a day. Between 12 Ml and 15 Ml of that water was being partially treated by mines, explained Water Affairs acting director water quality management for Gauteng Marius Keet. He added that the other 5 Ml of untreated water went through a natural filter, as the water flowed through a wetland.

The water in the Western basin flowed into the Tweelopies spruit.

"The impact of the toxic water is not yet known," said Sonjica, adding that the IMC sought to ensure that the negative impacts of the acid water that surrounding communities could be subjected to, were averted.

The Central basin, below the Johannesburg central business district was not yet decanting on the surface, but it was envisaged that without interventions such as pumping and treating the water, this could happen in about 17 months.

Keet said that the water was currently about 550 m below the surface in the Central basin, and the environmental critical level where water should not rise above, was 150 m below the surface. He stated that the water was rising at a rate of about 0,35 m a day in the Central basin.

During the summer rainy season, this rate of rise could be faster.

Keet said that if the water in the Central basin started to decant, it could do so at a rate of between 60 Ml/day and 70 Ml/day.

He said that the department had been given a year to design and build a pump station in the Central basin, thus the information presented to the IMC and Cabinet would be critical to inform this planning.

Keet also noted that a target had been set that by 2014, all AMD water from the Witwatersrand must be treated for use by industry, or even to potable water standards.

MONEY MATTERS

Funding for these interventions was a major issue, and Sonjica said that while she could not pre-empt where funds would come from to tackle the issue, it was likely that government would have to pay.

This was owing to the fact that about 70% of the liability rested with the government as many of the old mines contributing to the problem were ownerless and derelict. The remaining 30% of the liability in the Western basin rested with the private sector mining companies.

In the Central basin, the liability was split 50:50 between the government and the private sector.

It was stated that some R218-million was required for pumping and water treatment to contain the AMD problem, while the budget within the DMR allocated to the issue was R40-million.

"We have to get money by hook or by crook," said Sonjica, adding that once the report was presented, a credible cost could be attached to the problem. The IMC would then invite participants to assist with technology solutions. This would be sourced out by way of tendering if the government did not have any in-house capacity to deal with the problem.

Sonjica said that the IMC called for an intelligent and mature discourse on the issue, and added that many people were "selling panic", and trying to make profits by abusing the fear that existed that untreated water could decant to the surface in central Johannesburg.

She said that these claims came from companies, which said that they could solve the problems and that the government was suspicious of such entities.