What are the typical citizen concerns relating to mining and the environment?
Citizen attention has been focused on:
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environmental issues related to pollution, degradation, and restoration; |
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land use, which in some cases included water use. In some instances these have become emotional issues in which environmental and industry positions have become polarized, due to their respective perceptions of land preservation and of land use and resource development. |
What are the environmental impacts as a result of mineral resource development?
Impacts related to mineral resource development vary with mineral resource deposit and processing facility. The only generalization that can be made is that some environmental disturbance inevitably accompanies extraction, beneficiation, and processing of mineral resources.
Very large areas are often involved during the initial regional reconnaissance to obtain preliminary information on existence, location, grade of material, and size of deposit. But environmental impact caused by establishment of access routes to target prospects and of temporary base camps, plus limited tunneling, drilling, or trenching to collect samples can be minimized.
Helicopters are frequently used to establish and supply distant or inaccessible work sites, often eliminating the need for access roads during that phase of exploration. Unless a potentially valuable deposit is discovered and further study is indicated, the prospect is abandoned.
Where preliminary studies indicate the potential for a mineral deposit, further exploratory work is required. |
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More drilling and testing are necessary, but the area disturbed is restricted to the site of the potential deposit, often only a few hundred acres - seldom more than a few square miles. An economic discovery probably will lead to development of a mine.
The environmental effects of mining depend on the mineral being mined, the kind of deposit (bed, vein, or disseminated), the size of the deposit, mining methods required (surface or subsurface), regional features (topography and climate), or mitigating operational procedures utilized. Effects on water supply and quality also are major considerations. Both surface and subsurface mining involve the establishment of mine buildings, transportation, usually a concentration plant, provisions for mine waste disposal, and facilities for personnel - the movement of people and industry into what often is a sparsely inhabited area. Special problems may arise when mines are established near small rural communities and a large influx of temporary and more permanent residents strains local facilities and disrupts the usual pattern of life.
Mining operations in the United States are subject to extensive regulations at the local, state and federal levels. Where overlaps in regulatory jurisdiction exist, the industry must meet the more strict standard.
Mining companies are working hard to be responsible corporate citizens committed to protecting the health of employees and the general public. They are trying to minimize their negative impacts to the environment, securing the competitiveness of the domestic U.S. mining industry. They support regulations that promote these goals and acknowledge that existing laws have contributed to the industry's increasingly impressive record of safe, responsible mining practices.
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