Publication Name

MINING FOR CLOSURE

operations, such sites are frequently referred

to as being under care and maintenance.

Abandoned mine site

– an area formerly used

for mining operations (an idle/inactive site)

that is neglected and whose legal owners still

exist and can be located.

Orphaned mine site

– abandoned mining op-

erations or facilities for which the responsible

party no longer exists or cannot be located.

Mine Decommissioning

– the process that be-

gins near, or at, the cessation of mineral pro-

duction. This term is often used interchange-

ably with Mine Closure but here refers to a

transition period and activities between cessa-

tion of operations and final closure.

Rehabilitation

(Reclamation) – the return of the

disturbed land to a stable, productive and/or self-

sustaining condition, taking into account bene-

ficial uses of the site and surrounding land.

Progressive Rehabilitation

– A process refer-

ring to the ongoing rehabilitation of mine sites

and mineral related facilities during the opera-

tional life of a facility. Progressive rehabilitation

may include works such as re-vegetation of ar-

eas disturbed during project development and

operations, re-vegetation of abandoned or filled

mine waste areas including tailings impound-

ment areas; removal and/or disposal of any

obsolete structures and materials as per a final

rehabilitation and closure plan; backfilling of

approved underground or surface excavations

using mill tailings to reduce tailings impound-

ment areas; methods to reduce or eliminate

soil erosion and stabilization of the site which

will facilitate re-vegetation and reclamation;

placement of waste rock in the underground

workings or open pits, or by covering the waste

rock with till or topsoil and then re-vegetating

in an acceptable manner, and so forth.

Mining legacy

– (orphaned mines) abandoned

mining operations or facilities for which a re-

sponsible party no longer exists or cannot be lo-

cated. The term mining legacies can often refer

to a very much older site, where minerals op-

erations have ceased decades, or even centuries

ago. For reasons of its generality in the litera-

ture, this term is used loosely in this report.

Figure 1.1

Mineral site status diagram for this docu-

ment

Another very important term and concept utilised

in this document is

“best practice environmental

management in mining”

. In general, the usage of

this term (and the shorter term

“best environmental

practice mining”

) is intended to capture the man-

agement ethos portrayed in a series of more than

twenty booklets published by the Australian Gov-

ernment’s Department of Environment and Herit-

age. Each booklet seeks to describe best practice for

a particular key aspect of environmental (and in-

deed, social) management as applied by Australia’s

11. The concept of mine closure is an issue by itself. However, an

in-depth analysis is not within the scope of this report. For a more

complete analysis of the concept of mine closure see Mudder, Ter-

ry and Kevin Harvey, Closure Concepts. Mineral Resources forum,

UNEP, 1999. “There are many different words used to describe

closure including decommissioning, reclamation, rehabilitation,

and post-closure. In this paper, decommissioning is referred to as

the transitional period between cessation of operations and final

closure. Reclamation refers to the physical aspects of earth mov-

ing, regarding and revegetation. Rehabilitation is another word for

closure used primarily in countries other than the United States.

Closure is a term reserved for the point in time at which revegeta-

tion has been completed, excess solutions have been eliminated to

the extent practical, the maximum degree of passive management

has been implemented, and a final surface and/or ground water

monitoring programme has been initiated.”

12. In many instances throughout the literature, the term “legacy

site” is used somewhat interchangeable with “orphan site” and

even with “abandoned site”. Universally, its usage is also applied

in the general sense (such as “legacies of the past” and “legacies of

mining”). In the Caldata report cited above, “legacy” has been rede-

fined as an equivalent to “abandoned” for this report. For reasons

of the general application of the word “legacy”, that definition will

be avoided. In essence within this discussion, a legacy site is an or-

phan site, but the term can

also

encompass a site where regulatory

obligations (if they ever existed) for site reclamation were fulfilled

at the time of activity cessation (and thus where the tenement has

been relinquished and liability – if it ever existed – extinguished)

but where whatever reclamation performed was insufficient to

render the site “closed” as termed in this document (and as devel-

oped throughout this document).

13. Question marks (?) in this diagram indicate that the actual path-

way to be followed is unknown, or can be influenced.

Mine site

Orphan/Legacy

Abandoned

Active

Idle/inactive

Care &

maintenance

Neglected

Closed

•