INRTU and PJSC Polyus held a joint forum "Conscious Industrial Ecology"

Irkutsk Polytechnic University and Polyus Gold Mining Company held a joint forum "Conscious Industrial Ecology". The event was held on 3 June on the eve of World Environment Day.

The meeting was opened by Georgy Kuzmin, Deputy Chairman of the Government of Irkutak Region. He noted that the environmental agenda is important for the region:

"Now all efforts are focused on the remediation of BPPM's waste and the elimination of mercury pollution at the industrial site of Usoliekhimprom. When starting new projects on these territories, companies take on obligations to protect the environment.

At the forum, representatives of business, science, and government agencies will discuss mechanisms for solving environmental problems."

Vladimir Smirnov, Vice Rector for Academic Affairs at INRTU, added that the forum was attended by students wishing to present breakthrough ideas for recycling industrial waste. The activists joined the Polyus hackathon.

"Polyus is a strategic partner of our university. That is why students and teachers-mentors were happy to support the initiative to solve cases and organise the forum. Such events help develop professional competencies of future engineers," Vladimir Smirnov appealed to the representatives of MC Polyus.

The agenda of the forum included a panel discussion. The discussion was started by Alexander Karchevsky, Deputy Head of the State Environmental Supervision Service of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology of the Irkutsk Region. According to his information, the region has achieved significant success in solving environmental problems:

"Elimination of accumulated damage from BPPM and Usoliekhimprom will be completed by the end of 2024. At the moment we are working with unauthorised landfills, the number of which has decreased significantly. All facilities are included in the territorial scheme of waste management. The region also takes part in the Clean Air national project. In the near future, seven cities of Irkutsk region will join the programme - Irkutsk, Angarsk, Shelekhov, Cheremkhovo, Sayansk, Zima, Usolye-Sibirskoye."

The panel discussion was replaced by round tables, which included team-building games with discussions on the economic and social aspects of industrial ecology.

The debate was supported by Galina Sarapulova, Professor of the S. B. Leonov Department of Mineral Processing and Environmental Protection. S. B. Leonov Galina Sarapulova and Olga Kachor, head of the geoecology department of the Siberian School of Geosciences (SSG INRTU). Nadezhda Grosheva, Dean of the Siberian-American Faculty of Geosciences at the Irkutsk State University, and Ivan Boltenkov, Head of the Project Support and Monitoring Department of the Irkutsk Region Development Corporation, also took part in the round table discussion. Ivan Boltenkov.

At the end of the forum the results of the 'Ecological Hackathon' were summed up.