Company defends controversial tin mining scheme off Cornish coast

“MML have no proof of their sketchy claims.
They will be spending more on their PR machine than in any real valuable way to convince people that this is a good idea, when logic show's that it's a really bad idea.
here's to their failure and saving Cornwall's future.”

“Now before the SAS "throw the baby out with the bathwater". This could in fact be a goldmine for the surfing comunity. With a bit of clever organisation, the dredging and movement of the sand could be used to create artificial reefs. This is something that has been proposed before but couldn't be organised properly.
Just think of the wave you could build and the benefit it could be to the south west surfing community.
This should be explored before you shut down any industrial plans for tin extraction off the coast.”

“Agree Phil_lip that it is easy (at a cost) to build a controlling environment on lans ans it will be neccessary to do so when world commodity prices dictate the viability.

But having witnessed the recent storms where every single swell will move tens of thousands of substrate around to a depth of several feet in some places given the way sand levels rise and fall at Porthtowan this ove time will probably have concentrated heavy tin bearing sand in defined pockets which presumably will be what interests the dredgers.

Back in the late sixties a Stevenson trawler was chartered and spent several months taking core samples in both Ligger and Bassets Bay, there has been other sporadic work done in the interim, at the same time the Baymead was dredging in St Ives Bay off the mouth of the Red River, the sand being processed at Lelant to no siscernable ill effect.

Remember that tin in itself is not particularly toxic unlike arsenic lead or cadmium which are not involved in this scenario, I am a North Coast born and reared Cornish man who loves the place and would fight like a Tiger to prevent harm to it, however producing tin is what we have always done so lets get cracking and do it again, as Harry Safari said in the song that Radio Emmet will not play, "Lets hear it for the miners- who we hope will mine again".”

“Entitled to your opinion poldice but you can build a controlling environment to stop any leaching into the watercourses on land far easier than disturbing settled sediment on the sea bed.

I completely agree on the issues surrounding other pollutants we have a habit of not getting treated before release but then that would be a water company issue not a mining one.”

“Complete utter tosh, this is alluvial tin washed into the sea when the mines were working, its recovery will cause minimum seabed disturbance whereas moving old spoil heaps around will cause arsenic ets to leach into the soil or watercourses.

Ironically when Cornwalls mines were working everything went into the sea with little effect the Red River was literally red and the mackerel used to hang around the edge of the plume to hide from predators, much the same at Geevor, now the plumes are gone and the mackerel have disappeared.

The real problems are detergents, bleaches, pesticide residues and fertiliser runoff which unlike a mineral plume are man made persistent chemicals which do harm sealife.”

“Disgusting, the heaps around all the mines in Cornwall would be better to get minerals from than the sea bed as well as being able to control any pollution from it. To try and claim it will have no effect is pathetic because even a child would know it will.”