Rio Tinto fined $2M for contaminating water near Quebec mine

The Court of Quebec has ordered Rio Tinto Iron and Titanium Inc. to pay fines totalling $2 million for infractions related to the discharge of harmful effluent into waterways.

The company pled guilty to eight counts of violating the Fisheries Act and the Metal and Diamond Mining Effluent Regulations, said Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) in a news release Tuesday morning. 

Rio Tinto operates a mine at Lac Tio, about 43 kilometres northeast of Havre-Saint-Pierre, Que., in the Côte-Nord.

The ECCC says it identified multiple deposits of harmful substances between February and August 2023. The company also failed to take a sample following an unauthorized deposit of a harmful substance in November 2023.

The agency says some of the effluent, or treated wastewater discharge, from the Lac Tio mine flows into Lac Petit Pas.

ECCC launched an investigation into the company in October 2023 which found that in February, an accidental severing of electrical cables disrupted the pumping and treatment system at a final discharge point, leading to excessive levels of nickel in the effluent.

Later that summer, the ECCC observed effluent with a low pH, which it says is harmful to fish. 

"The investigation revealed that at the time of these offences, this effluent was not treated," said the agency.

In a statement, a spokesperson for Rio Tinto said that environmental protection remains a priority for the company. 

"Concrete measures have been implemented and are ongoing to ensure the compliance of our effluents," reads the statement. 

The company added that in 2024, it invested $8 million "to improve the robustness of the system designed to capture, pump, and treat the effluents."

Rio Tinto already appeared on the ECCC's Environmental Offenders Registry after being fined $600,000 in 2023 for two incidents where contaminated effluent reached the St. Lawrence River. The events happened at the company's complex in Sorel-Tracy, Que., in 2020.