LKAB runs a three-kilometer tunnel in Kiruna to investigate the Per Geijer deposit and now the tunnel drive has been stopped halfway after the discovery. The soil must be sanitized before the tunnel construction can continue.
Shared sentences
– We will install a purification plant and a pool to handle and clean the water from PFAS, says Magnus Backe, area manager at LKAB Kiruna.
There are shared opinions about where the chemicals originally come from. LKAB claims that it is the rescue service’s fire exercise area and the municipality’s responsibility to tend above ground ..
– Our responsibility is to clean up underground, says Magnus Backe.
May have spread to fishing area
Kiruna Municipality has never examined the mining area in Luossavaara apart from the fire exercise area. They claim that there are several companies that have used the industrial area, such as LKAB that have been there for decades.
The municipality will now investigate the spread above ground and if it has spread to nearby watercourses such as the popular fishing water Tuollujärvi.
– If there is a pollution on the ground and it comes water, it will come down. In this case 700 meters underground and to the groundwater, says Helena Söderlund, environmental manager at Kiruna municipality.