Last Friday in January, the multipurpose room in Glomel (Côtes-d’Armor), one thousand three hundred and fifty inhabitants, is full. On the platform, the mayor, Bernard Trubuilt, presents his wishes for the first time: he was elected in September 2023, during early elections triggered by a wave of resignations within the municipal council. Since June 2022, the request from the French multinational Imerys to expand its mining site has divided the community.
The new mayor takes advantage of the wishes to give a voice to the six companies established in the Breton village. The Imerys group has operated Europe’s only andalusite quarry there since 1970. This rare mineral, known for its resistance to thermal shock, is used in the steel industry, foundries and cement works. Each year, 1.2 million tonnes are extracted from the quarry for a final production of 65,000 tonnes, or 25% of world production. The mine is surrounded by imposing gray mounds, formed by the accumulation of mining residues.
The director of the 250-hectare site, Christelle Planque, therefore took advantage of the platform offered by the mayor to speak about the extension of the quarry, with the construction of a fourth pit, for which the new municipal council gave a favorable opinion. “If we do not obtain this authorization [de la part du préfet, notamment]mine activity will have to stop around 2030”, insists, a few days later, the project manager, Thomas Louvet, stressing that this would lead to the elimination of one hundred and twenty jobs at the mine.
During the public inquiry concerning the fourth pit, carried out in the fall of 2023, four hundred and twenty-eight observations were made, compared to only a dozen during the 2018 inquiry concerning the third pit. Among them, the opinion of Arnaud and Sandra, who do not wish their names to be published, living near the site: the nuisance has “multiplied since 2018. The shots from the quarry shake the windows, the water from the recuperators is black, there is even a crack in one of the walls of the house.”
A petition against the project
“We have suffered from this mine and its factory for fifty years, we are fed up”, rants Jean-Daniel Bourdonnay, seated with three other opponents in a bar in the town. The 46-year-old beekeeper, who lives a few hundred meters from the quarry, is part of the Réfrac’Terres residents’ association, created in the summer of 2022, after the announcement of the extension project.. “It’s never going to stop. After pit 4, we will have pit 5″, imagine, opposite him, Jean-Yves Jego, opposition municipal councilor and retired goat breeder, at the origin of the environmental association Douar Bev (“living land”). A petition against the project has already collected five thousand six hundred signatures.
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