Alcoa statement on WA EPA progress on environmental impact assessment of mine plans

The Western Australian Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) today released the scoping document for its environmental impact assessment of parts of Alcoa’s previous and current five-year mine plans – known as the 2022-2026 and 2023-2027 Mining and Managing Programs (MMPs).

The scoping document follows EPA’s determination in December 2023 that parts of these plans should be assessed.

It sets out the requirements for the environmental assessment. It includes an indicative timeline that estimates a public comment period in the first quarter of 2025 and the EPA’s final report and recommendations in the third quarter of 2025. Following the steps in the EPA’s process, the Minister for the Environment will make a final decision on the assessment.

In addition to the indicative environmental assessment timeline, the scoping document also states that the EPA would prefer to align the public comment period for the assessment of the MMPs with the public comment period for a separate environmental assessment for two of Alcoa’s future mining regions – Myara North and Holyoake. This would shift the public comment period for the two future mine regions from later in 2024 to the first quarter of 2025.

Alcoa Interim Vice President Operations – Australia, Tanya Simmonds, said the company remains committed to working with the EPA and other stakeholders to reduce approvals complexity and to ensure thorough and timely environmental impact assessments of its current and future bauxite mining in the State.

“We are focused on modernising the approvals framework for our bauxite mining in WA and securing certainty for our operations and all stakeholders,” Ms Simmonds said.