Publication Name

MINING FOR CLOSURE

This section will draw together points from this

document that are considered to be of particular

salience in the SEE/TRB context. The choice of ma-

terial here is influenced very much by a number of

parameters (characteristics) that most of the SEE/

TRB countries have in common. While other coun-

tries around the world share some of these charac-

teristics, the mining countries of this part of Europe

share a geographical location and historical pathway

that combines with their geological resources in a

unique manner. Some of the parameters shared by

most or all countries in the region are that:

the mining sector is a very important contribu-

tor to local and national economies and that

ongoing and new mining activities will be re-

quired to underpin the economies in the fu-

ture;

the countries are (relatively) rich in mineral

resources and have a long history of mineral

resource extraction activities;

there already exists a serious history of min-

ing accidents, due in part to the widespread

neglect of environmental safety and human

security issues combined with sub-standard

extraction and waste management activities,

particularly in the post 1945 era;

transboundary pollution risks associated with

mining and mineral processing activities and

the legacies of such past activities are many

and marked;

nation states have been subject to marked

changes in economic and political circum-

stances, conflict, and socio-economic hardship

during the 1990s that have exacerbated the

problems associated with some sites;

accession to the European Union is imminent

or foreseeable, and compliance with a range of

EU environmental and safety regulations is re-

quired for that process to proceed;

legislative frameworks addressing mining and

minerals processing activities, extractive in-

dustry legacies as well as accountability (and

jurisdictional remit) for the environmental

aspects of these activities are still in a state of

development or flux;

documentation of sites of pollution and un-

derstanding of the geochemistry of extractive

industry legacies, degrees of risk and under-

standing and so forth are relatively poor;

capacity within institutions supporting the

extractive industries as well as those guiding

transboundary risk management and/or disas-

ter response are currently insufficient to deal

with the task at hand;

as economies in transition, national fiscal re-

serves available for the financing of site recla-

mation work, and/or social welfare “nets” for

the support of communities affected by the

environmental impacts of the extractive indus-

tries, or the closure of mining operations, may

be minimal or non-existent.

mining for closure in see/trb

82. Countries are the producers or receivers of chronic and (po-

tentially) acute pollution from their neighbours that can include:

airborne transport of pollutants such as dust, smelter emissions,

gases, vapours; mass movement of “solid” wastes (generally tail-

ings containing heavy metals and toxic compounds); mass move-

ment of liquid, or semi-liquid wastes (again, generally tailings

containing heavy metals and toxic compounds); waterborne trans-

port of wastes as suspended solids and as dissolved materials.

Obsolete smelter and concentrator infrastructure

– Romania

Photograph by Philip Peck

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