Robust environmental monitoring remains the cornerstone to delivering our above compliance environmental performance. During 2014 the Environmental Management Plan and supporting procedures were overhauled and, as part of departmental harmonisation, combined with the Safety Management System to produce a ‘Safety, Health and Environmental Management System’. The roll out of this system started at the end of the year and continued through Q1 of 2015.

Our monitoring programme includes routine vibration and noise measurements during blasting activities. Monitoring points have been selected based on the pit in which blasting is taking place and areas that might be affected such as local villages or mine accommodation camps. No adverse impacts related to blasting have been recorded from these points.

2014 saw Avocet’s largest reforestation effort with almost 28,000 trees planted around the Inata site and in specially established village ‘forests’. The village ‘forests’ were developed with technical and capital support from Avocet and have been handed over to communities as a positive living legacy of Inata community involvement.

Almost all of Avocet’s emissions of CO2 derive from its consumption of diesel, which is used as the fuel for the mining and auxiliary fleet, and in the generators used to generate electricity for the processing plant and site. The production of CO2 is estimated using standard CO2 production rates per litre of diesel fuel consumed.

In 2014, the Inata mine produced 13,398 tonnes of CO2, or the equivalent of 0.16 tonnes per ounce of gold produced. The following table, which shows the equivalent results over the previous four years, indicates a gradual increase in the quantity of CO2 emitted on a per ounce basis, which can be attributed to the falling grades and recoveries seen in the production at the mine, and longer haul distances. Despite this we were able to maintain the same CO2 tonnes per ounce as in 2013 demonstrating in part the effectiveness of our continued efforts to minimise consumption.