Provide details for the applicant and contact person
The application must include basic information for the applicant: company name, business ID, head office and contact details. The contact details must include the name, telephone number and email address of a person who can provide further information about the application (i.e. not the company switchboard).
The application must include the trade register extract for the company. The extract may not be older than three months.
Describe the company’s capability for exploration
An applicant must have sufficient skills and resources to carry out exploration for it to receive a permit. Describe the funding for the planned exploration. Also describe the personnel and its expertise in the described exploration activity.
Find out whether restrictions apply to the use of the area
Certain characteristics of the area may prevent the issue of an exploration permit or cause restrictions on the permit. The application must include the following information about the area:
- What is the land use plan for the area? You can find this out from the city or town website. Secondary sources include the Master Plan Service.
- Is the area located in or near a nature conservation area? Information about nature conservation areas is available from the Ministry of the Environment website and the Mining Register Map Service.
- Are there other obstacles in the area as specified in the Mining Act (e.g. military areas, cemeteries, border zones)?
Also describe how you intend to take the features of the area into account when operating there.
The authorities will assess other properties of the area that may prevent a permit from being granted (e.g. a valid land use plan or other obstacles referred to in section 46 of the Mining Act) or cause restrictions to the permit. Restrictions on the permit may be imposed due to factors such as protected plant, bird, fish or insect species, rare habitats, other significant natural values, and fixed prehistoric relics that fall within the scope of the Antiquities Act (e.g. ancient settlements, burial sites, cairns and Lapland stone ruins).
More information on the flora and fauna of the area is available at the Finnish Biodiversity Info Facility website.
Present an assessment of the mined minerals in the area
Also provide a short description of what the assessment is based on.
Create a spatial data set on the area
Include the size and location of the exploration permit area. Attach information to the application as a spatial data set.
The following spatial data is required:
- The exploration permit area (in full), excluding obstacles.
- A generic map that indicates the location of the area.
- Property lines that restrict the exploration area, in a separate file (not incl. neighbours).
Describe the interested parties
Include all parties that have rights or interests in the specific exploration permit area. It is important to identify the interested parties, as this allows them to be informed of the permit application and express their opinion on the permit. This information also helps Tukes assess the requirements for the permit and the permit conditions.
Describe the following interested parties:
- Livelihoods in the area: peat production, professional forestry, wind power, land and aggregate sites and, in Lapland, reindeer herding cooperatives.
- Jointly owned areas: describe all jointly owned areas in the application permit area and contact details thereof (e.g. jointly owned forests and participants’ associations).
- Landowners: Prepare a list of landowners in the Tukes template. Prepare and submit this only when asked for by Tukes. It is used in the hearing process – the information must be up-to-date.
This information is available from the National Land Survey of Finland.
Include an exploration plan
Describe the survey methods and tools you are planning to use (airborne geophysics, terrain geophysics, survey drainage, BOT samples, bedrock drilling, test extraction). Describe, as accurately as possible at the moment of application, what kind of work on the terrain you intend to do, including the methods and machines. Also provide an estimate of the amount, start and duration of the work.
Include a waste management plan for extractive waste. The waste management plan relies heavily on whether the planned drilling sites have specially protected sites under the Nature Conservation Act or if the sites are located in groundwater areas. Conversely, if the applicant knows the bedrock composition, the waste management plan may propose to deposit the extractive waste in the extraction site, if financially and technically possible without prohibited environmental pollution.
Assess the environmental and other impacts of the operation
Describe how the planned exploration affects the environment and how you intend to minimise the impacts. Consider all the issues mentioned below.
Environmental and nature protection
If the application area is located in a nature conservation area, or the application area is of otherwise significant environmental value (such as nationally significant rocky areas or national landscapes), assess the possible impact of the planned exploration on these. Also describe how you intend to mitigate these impacts. If your assessment is that your exploration will not impact the environmental values of the area, as well as the basis for this assessment.
Water bodies
If there are water bodies in this area, assess how your exploration plans could impact them. Also describe how you intend to mitigate these impacts. If you do not intend to carry out surveys close to a water body or on the ice during winter, make a mention of this. It is also recommended to consider the vicinity to water bodies in the extractive waste management plan (such as how drilling sludge is processed and how it is prevented from flowing into surface water).
Groundwater
If the area includes classified groundwater provinces, describe how they will be considered and if your exploration plans impact groundwaters.
In a groundwater area, an exploration permit decision includes various restrictions, such as no vehicle refuelling, specifications to the extractive waste management plan, or disallowing survey drainage in these areas.
People
Early exploration does not impact people. For later stages of the survey, assess if the planned exploration process (such as test extraction) might damage public safety or human health.
Other livelihoods
Assess if your exploration plan impacts other livelihoods in the area, such as peat production, agriculture or forestry, or reindeer herding. Keep in mind that the time of your exploration will impact its effect on other livelihoods (e.g. there are very few agriculture activities in winter). Provide mitigation measures, if you intend to carry out surveys on fields outside the harvest season (e.g. removal of group pipes after drilling and processing of possible drilling sludge).
Rights of the Sámi people
If the area you are applying to explore is located in the Sámi Homeland, assess how your exploration plan might affect the rights of the Sámi people to maintain and develop their language and culture as well as engage in traditional livelihoods in the area. Read more about Sámi activities in the area and study, for example, the Sámi Parliament website.
State if you intend to build in the area
If you intend to build in the area, describe the building and its location. Also include the purpose of the building and the duration of its use.
Propose a collateral
Exploration permits include a collateral to compensate for any harm or damage as well as to carry out post-exploration measures. The amount of the collateral is issued by Tukes, but you may also propose your own. Provide a justification for such a proposal.
Plan and describe the post-exploration measures
After the exploration effort is put on hold or completed, the area must be tidied up as soon as it is possible, such as after winter. All survey equipment and other items that do not belong in the area must be removed from the survey sites.
If you have had to fell trees, determine their amount and compensate the landowner. This compensation can be agreed directly with the landowner. If doing so is not possible, forest management associations, among others, can help to determine the correct amount. Felled trees must be neatly stacked.
If the survey has included survey drainage, open pits and ditches must be covered as soon as possible.
Applications are public
Applications are, by rule, public and can be used as a public notice.
If some of the information necessary to assess the permit application is confidential, do not include that information on the application form for it to be announced publicly. Deliver the confidential information to Tukes in a separate document. Clearly state which information in the document is confidential and the justification therefore. Make sure that the public application meets the requirements of section 34 of the Mining Act.
If necessary, apply for an enforcement order
If an applicant wishes to start the exploration activities before the permit decision becomes legally valid, they may apply for an enforcement order for the exploration permit application.
This enforcement order can be applied for with the same form as the exploration permit. The application must include a justification for why it is necessary to start the activities before the decision is legally valid. The applicant must show that it is necessary to start the activities as soon as possible due to survey timing, the season, or another technical or financial reason. The applicant must also show that an enforcement order does not cause significant harm to the environment, the landowners, or other rightsholders.
Based on the application, Tukes will assess if the conditions for an enforcement order are met.
Submit the application to Tukes
Submit the application to [email protected]. After submitting the form, you will receive an automatic acknowledgement of receipt.
