Tailings are a common by-product of the mining process, consisting of fine rock particles left over after crushing or washing mined rock. Tailings are stored in specially constructed impoundments to maintain safe storage. These tailings storage facilities are designed to both keep the tailings secure and ensure that they do not impact the surrounding environment.

Historically, tailings storage facilities in the mining industry have been well-managed with few incidents. However, improper management can lead to preventable disasters. Recent tragic events at non-Teck mine sites in Brazil, notably Samarco in 2015 and Brumadinho in 2019, show how extreme these catastrophes can be and why safe management of tailings storage facilities is essential.

Centralized Tailings Oversight

At Teck, we have a well-established central governance program for the management of tailings across all projects, operations and legacy facilities. In a standard approach to tailings governance, facilities are managed at the site level. Under this type of oversight, engineers work to ensure the safety of each facility by conducting regular inspections and maintenance. This site level approach has been shown to be very effective for the industry and remains an important component of Teck’s tailings program.

To ensure safety of all facilities, Teck has implemented an additional layer of responsibility and oversight, which has been deemed industry-leading by outside reviewers. A central Tailings Working Group (TWG) has been established at the corporate level, which ensures that a consistent and industry-leading approach to managing tailings is applied across all our sites.

Teck的TWG包括从本公司中挑选的高级主题专家，具有广泛的经验，可在尾矿设施管理方面进行广泛的经验。本集团的一些关键职责包括：

• 制定和监督Teck对尾矿管理政策的实施;
• Serve as technical advisors for tailings-related projects and activities;
• 对我们的尾矿设施以及我们的主要尾矿项目进行内部治理审查;
• Participating in both internal Project Boards and external tailings assurance activities such as Tailings Review Boards;
• 筛选第三方合格的工程师，以批准在Teck项目上工作;
• Support internal and external research and development opportunities for emerging tailings-related technologies

Supporting the Development of a Global Tailings Standard

A final key function of our TWG is participation in industry and stakeholder collaboration. In 2020, the Chair of our TWG participated as the industry advisor to an Expert Panel formed to create theGlobal Industry Standard on Tailings Management, published in August 2020. The Standard aims to enhance the safety of mine tailings across the globe, through improved transparency, accountability and heightened consideration for the rights of local communities.

许多核心治理元素在本标准中反映了多年的核心治理元素。TWG现在正在努力实施Teck的新标准，并继续在发展即将到来的尾矿指导方面发挥领导作用。

Teck的尾矿manbetx体育官网治理结构已经在我们的行业中得到了认可，我们的几个同行表达了实施类似的监督模型，以改善自己的治理结构。与此同时，我们知道我们的尾矿治理总有进一步改善的空间。manbetx体育官网我们的TWG通过正在进行的内部讨论，研发和定期独立评论来解决这个机会。

Tailings storage facility safety is a top priority to ensure the safety of our employees, our communities and the environments where we operate. Through this innovative approach to management, we continue to search for new ways to enhance our safety performance both now and for the future.

Read more about our approach totailings managementon our website.