Mining for Closure: Policies, practises and guidelines for sustainable mining and closure of mines

Tributary bearing acidic effluent contaminated with heavy metals – Abrud River, Romania Photograph by Philip Peck

mental liability facing the mining industry and, to a lesser extent, the public through abandoned mines. MEND was implemented to develop and apply new technologies to prevent and control acidic drainage and tremendous progress has been made. The target is for newmines to open without long-term concerns about acidic drainage upon closure. The MEND manual in particular, summarizes the work complet- ed by MEND in a format that provides practitioners in Canadian industry and government – and in other interested jurisdictions – with a manageable single reference document. The document is not a “How to” manual. It is a set of comprehensive working ref- erences for the sampling and analyses, prediction, prevention, control, treatment and monitoring of acidic drainage. The document provides information on chemistry, engineering, economics, case studies and scientific data for mine and mill operators, engi- neering design and environmental staff, consulting engineers, universities and governments. Explanations and definitions for other terms uti- lized within the mining and minerals industry that are also utilized within this report or its references, are included at the end of this document.

introduced here (as Best Practice Environmental Management was in the preceding text section).

In this instance a huge body of work has been per- formed internationally. As one prominent example, the Canadian MEND programme and its techni- cal literature outputs are highlighted as a source of prominence. 15 In response to the projected high li- abilities facing the Canadian mining industry from acidic drainage from the oxidation of sulphide min- erals, 16 the Canadian mining industry, the Canadian federal government and eight provincial govern- ments joined forces in 1989 to form the Mine En- vironment Neutral Drainage (MEND) programme. 17 Acidic drainage is recognized as the largest environ- 15. MEND has over 200 technical documents available. Techni- cal reports published under the auspices of MEND are available both in electronic and print formats - see http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/ mms/canmet-mtb/mmsl-lmsm/mend/mendpubs-e.htm 16. In 1999, this phenomena was recognized as the largest envi- ronmental liability, estimated to be between $2 billion and $5 bil- lion, facing the Canadian mining industry (Tremblay, 1999). 17. See http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/mms/canmet-mtb/mmsl-lmsm/ rnet/indart-e.htm and http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/mms/canmet- mtb/mmsl-lmsm/mend/default_e.htm

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MINING FOR CLOSURE