Technical Audits of Dam Safety in Brazil

Challenge

In early 2019, the Brumadinho tailings dam at the Córrego do Feijão iron ore mine catastrophically collapsed and 270 people were killed. This followed the 2015 failure at another mine, the Germano mine, in which 19 people were killed.

Solution

As a result of these failures, SLR has been selected to support MPMG with dam safety audits to assess the condition of dams owned by Vale S.A. SLR’s role is to provide continuous auditing for the public prosecutors in the state of Minas Gerais of the design, operations and remedial construction activities for the 33 structures in our package of works, all located within 100 kilometers of Belo Horizonte, the state capital of Minas Gerais.

Highlights

• SLR is one of four global consulting firms working on these audits of dam safety and safety for workers and the public
• SLR is a part of a steering committee investigating and advising on the adoption of new methods and procedures for conducting dam breach and inundation studies using non-Newtonian flow methods that will be adopted as Brazilian standards
• The audits are conducted in accordance with the Brazilian safety norms, Canadian Dam Association Dam Safety Guidelines, and international best practice related to dam safety stewardship, corporate governance and public safety