2014 – Rio Tinto refuses to clean up in Bougainville 

Apr 1, 2021

The governments of Bougainville and Papua New Guinea start planning how to clean up the severely polluted site of the Panguna mine. Rio Tinto was meant to play a supporting role in this but ends up walking away from the problem and the environmental degradation it...

1972 – Waste dumping starts in Bougainville

Apr 1, 2021

Operations start at the Panguna copper-gold mine in Bougainville, an island off the coast of Papua New Guinea. The mine is operated by Bougainville Copper Limited (BCL), a subsidiary of Conzinc Riotinto Australia, one of the precursors of what is now Rio Tinto. The...