Ulick Burke (Galway East, Fine Gael)
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Question 502: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government the action he will take to make safe, for health and safety as well as environmental reasons, the former mine site at Tynagh, Loughrea, County Galway, in view of the recent Environmental Protection Agency report which highlighted the high levels of serious contamination at the site; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28164/10]

John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)
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The remediation of mine sites is not a matter for my Department. The standing Government position is that Ministers are responsible for the environmental implications of their own policy areas and programmes.

In accordance with Directive 2006/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 15 March 2006 on the management of waste from the extractive industries (the Mining Waste Directive), Member States are obliged to ensure that an inventory of closed waste facilities, including abandoned waste facilities, located in their territory which cause serious negative environmental impacts or have the potential to become in the medium or short term a serious threat to human health, is drawn up and periodically updated. This inventory has been compiled in a project involving the EPA, the Geological Survey of Ireland and the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources and was published on 25 March 2010 by that Department, ahead of the 2012 deadline set out in the Directive.

I understand that the Study assessed over 100 sites, and that three sites, including the Tynagh mine, are classified as class 1 from a contaminant point of view, requiring a full environmental risk assessment to be carried out, if not already undertaken. My Department will be meeting with the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources shortly in order to map out a strategy for such facilities generally.