Barrick Mining Corporation - Sustainability - Environment

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Beyond Closure: Designing a Resilient Future

At Barrick, closure is not an afterthought. It is a core part of responsible mining. From the moment we begin planning a mine, we also plan for its closure. Through concurrent rehabilitation, we actively manage liabilities, ensuring our operations remain sustainable – both environmentally and economically.

We are also committed to addressing legacy sites from past acquisitions, applying the same principles of long-term environmental stewardship and economic resilience. Because responsible companies do not walk away; they plan, restore and build for the future.

From Extraction to Regeneration: A Holistic Approach

Mine closure is one of the most complex challenges in mining but, when done right, is one that transforms liabilities into long-term assets. Our approach to closure is governed by our closure standard which sets out the following guiding principles:

Nature-considered design – we integrate biodiversity and progressive land rehabilitation into daily operations to prevent long-term degradation.
Water-smart solutions – we prioritize passive, nature-based solutions that restore hydrological balance and work to actively remove the need for perpetual water treatment.
Climate-resilient closure – our closure plan factors in future climate risks, from extreme weather to shifting water availability.
Community-led transitions – we work with host communities to co-create economic opportunities beyond mining, reducing dependency and fostering resilience.

Our closure plans are living documents, evolving with site conditions, stakeholder input and the latest environmental science to ensure enduring positive outcomes.

Water and Climate: Closing Without Long-term Liabilities

Mine closure must account for the realities of climate change – rising temperatures, shifting precipitation patterns and extreme weather events that can threaten infrastructure and long-term water security. A mine closed today must still be resilient in 50 years.

We reject the idea of perpetual water treatment as a default solution. It’s not sustainable financially or environmentally. These systems are energy-intensive, costly to maintain indefinitely and vulnerable to climate variability. Instead, we invest in preventative design: sustainable landforms that reduce erosion, passive treatment of wetlands and hydrological restoration that returns the land to a more natural and self-sustaining state.

This approach doesn’t just reduce long-term environmental risks – it makes business sense. By tackling potential liabilities now, we avoid higher costs, complexity and risk down the line. It's a smarter way to close: one that protects our balance sheet while meeting our responsibility to future generations.

Closure – Sustainability Report 2024

Management approach: Closure

Governance and accountability

Our President and CEO is ultimately responsible for environmental and social management with our Group Sustainability Executive and our Director, Reclamation and Closuretaking a lead in driving the implementation of our environmental and social policies, the associated procedures and overall performance – including for closure planning.

The Group Sustainability Executive is supported by regional-level environmental leads as well as dedicated site-level environmental teams who drive implementation at the operational level, and our social teams who help drive develop programmes throughout the mine life that deliver positive social closure.

Policies and procedures

Our approach to mine closure reflects our ambition to share the benefits with stakeholders. Even in closure, our goal is to maximize the value for the local community. How we manage both the environmental and social aspects of closure is set out in our Closure Standard – which was refreshed in 2022. This requires us to:

Apply a mitigation hierarchy to manage our negative environmental impacts, so we avoid these wherever possible and minimize those which cannot be avoided;
Minimize our use of water and control our impacts on water quality;
Engage with stakeholders including local communities to support sustainable management of water resources for the benefit of all local users; and
Use energy as efficiently as possible.

To deliver on our commitments under our Closure Standard and applicable regulatory requirements, we establish closure plans for all our mines before construction begins. These plans outline the steps to be taken throughout the mine life to deliver an effective and environmentally sound end to operations, including rehabilitation of the surrounding area and protection of water resources. These plans are regularly updated, and a proportion of each mine’s annual budget is set aside and ringfenced each year to ensure all closure obligations are met.

All operational sites develop detailed and quantifiable concurrent rehabilitation plans each year and we report annually in our sustainability report on the total amount of land disturbed and not yet rehabilitated at our mine sites.

Our closure plans identify steps to be taken throughout mine life to deliver safe and sustainable closure from an environmental perspective, as well as elements of social closure. The plans are designed to be iterative and agile, while considering long term principles, and are regularly updated.

We regularly undertake Closure Cost Assessments to review and update each operations closure costs and update budgets and financial planning. These reviews are undertaken both internally and by external consultants and reviewed by our auditors.

Key targets and metrics

Proportion of operational sites achieving annual reclamation targets.
Annually we also report:

Total land disturbed and not yet rehabilitated
Total amount of land newly disturbed
Total amount of land newly rehabilitated or divested
Total land disturbed and not yet rehabilitated

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