Study calls for Brunswick smelter cleanup

A recent study into working conditions at Brunswick Mining and Smelting’s (TSE) lead smelter in Belledune, N.B., has found that contaminants contained in the plant are affecting the health of employees. The study by Dr. Rosemary Marchant, Dalhousie University occupational health physician, found that a large percentage of the plant’s 540 employees suffer from high levels of heavy metals in their blood and urine.

Of 26 employees found to be healthy, 24 had been working at the smelter for one year or less, the study said.

Those conclusions have confirmed what medical experts and employee representatives have been saying for the past 10 years: the 60,000-ton-per-year operation needs to be cleaned up.

“There are problems, we don’t deny that, but they have been blown out of proportion,” said Richard Faucher, vice-president of the company’s smelting group, who believes that the method used to determine the high metal level in employee’s blood and urine may have inflated the results. The tests, based on a threshold of 40 micrograms per decilitre, showed 24% of employees had high metal levels.

“If the study had used the same threshold (50 micrograms per decilitre) used by other jurisdictions in North America and Europe, only 2% of workers would have been found to have high metal levels in their blood and urine,” he said.

Results of the study have also served to heighten tensions between management and employees at a time when the 67% owned Noranda (TSE) subsidiary is attempting to turn a profit from an operation which lost $12 million last year.

Faucher indicated that Brunswick may not be able to adopt all of the study’s recommendations, unless it can enlist the support of employees in its bid to reduce costs.

After experiencing an average loss of $1 million per month last year, Brunswick has increased the concentrate grade to 45% from 34%. The amount of ore treated has also been reduced to 150,000 tons annually from 200,000 tons last year.

While a company spokesman claims that conditions at Belledune are no worse than other smelter operations in North America, results of the study are cited by unions as a major reason why an illegal strike that lasted one week was called June 28.

Barring unforeseen developments, 440 hourly wage smelter employees will call a second strike when the current 3-year contract expires July 21, said Gerald Allard, vice-president, Local 7085 of the United Steelworkers of America.

Dr. Marchant was on vacation and, therefore, unavailable for comment when The Northern Miner tried to reach her at Dalhousie. But according to another physician who worked at Belledune for over a year, most of the problems there could be solved if communications between management and employees were improved.

“Communication is problem number one,” said Dr. Jacques Levesque, who resigned last year because nothing was being done to rectify that situation. His successor Dr. Donald Dufresne resigned two weeks ago. “If people could have solved that problem, everything else would have disappeared long ago,” Levesque said.

Another problem is that Brunswick hasn’t developed the technology needed to remove contaminants like thallium and cadmium from ore treated in the smelting process, said Levesque. As a result, the contaminants are continuously recycled through the smelting process, he said. Cadmium is thought to cause lung cancer while thallium was formerly used as an ingredient in rat poison.

The Marchant study recommends that Brunswick undertake a thorough cleanup of the workplace and implement a high quality health and safety program. However, these recommendations are being made at a time when Brunswick is attempting to cut costs and reduce the workforce at both its smelter and fertilizer plant.

To improve working conditions, the company will spend $750,000 this year to upgrade the ventilation system, said Richard Faucher, vice- president of the company’s smelting group. A proposal for an additional $1.5 million for new working facilities will also be presented to the Brunswick board this summer, he said.

While Levesque claims that $750,000 won’t go very far, Faucher says smelter employees must double their production rate if they want the operation to remain in business.

According to Faucher, it is unlikely that negotiations between management and union, which broke down June 18, will be reopened before the current wage contract expires. But he said the strike at Brunswick’s huge lead-zinc mine near New Brunswick means that the smelter would have had to be shut down anyway.