Mining

Mining
Mining involves extraction of metals or other resources from rocks
Ores are mineral deposits that can be economically mined
Typically, the extraction the metals involves grinding to sand-sized particles, and
separation using water and various chemicals

Tailings are what's left over, after extraction of resources
The leftovers from one mine is called a tailing; from several mines, tailings.
Most of the ore, sometimes as high as 97%, from a mining operation, ends up as
tailings.
It usually amounts to hundreds of thousands of tonnes a year at a mine site.

What to do with the tailings?
Some mines do not use water extraction, (examples are coal and petroleum). The
tailings are simply piled up, and used to reclaim the site
In mines where there is water extraction, have tailing dams which are used to store the
tailings
Or they just let them they let them go into the sea.
Both methods of disposal have advantages and disadvantages.

Types of extraction (concentration of the ore)
Cyanide extraction for Gold
Flotation with foaming agents most metals
Just plain digging and separation coal, diamonds, gravel
METHODS OF MINING
STRIP and OPEN PIT MINING
When ore bodies are close to surface, it is sometimes
economical to remove the overlying rock to expose the
ore body.
The surface soil is stripped off and stockpiled for later
land reclamation.
ALLUVIAL MINING
Often ore deposits, especially gold, are located in river
sediments
These are recovered by dredges, or by hand panning or
sluice boxes
HARD ROCK MINING
These are mined by underground tunnels
Ore or coal brought to the surface by lifts
Dangerous!

METHODS OF MINING
OPEN PIT MINING and STRIP MINING

Open pit mining digs a large hole in the earth
The mine goes down in layers, removing the soil
(overburden) until the ore layer in exposed
The overburden is stockpiled for later mine reclamation
The ore is processed , usually on site, producing
tailings and ore concentrate

Strip mining just goes down the face of a hill.
Strip mining, - destroys whatever land it is on.

Both open pit mining and strip mining are can be
very destructive.
In the mountains strip mining will destroy vegetation
and lead to mud slides and severe soil erosion.

Typical strip mine operations
blasting
overburden Coal
removed
removal
Loose rock
Open Pit, Strip Mine, Dredge
Methods of Mining
DREDGING

Dredging is another mining process that affects
our environment.
The dredging machine goes along the bottom of a lake
or pond and scoops material onto a conveyer belt.
Once the material is on the conveyer belt the dredger
sorts it and dumps the waste material behind it.

When the dredger dumps the waste product
behind it, the sediments and large rock types
pollute the water and kill more wild life and
vegetation.

The only reason why the dredger does not
receive as much criticism as the open pit and
strip mines, is because you can't see it.

Cyanide extraction for Gold
PROCESS: Preparation
ground into fine powder
mixed in solution of NaCN (sodium cyanide) & water
referred as SLURRY

PROCESS: extraction
Zinc powder is added to this gold-cyanide solution which precipitates out the
gold -
The mixture then goes thru a filter where the precipitate sticks to a heavy
canvas filter which is later cleaned to remove the gold.
Extreme heat is applied which burns off the Zn

ENVIRONMENT:
Gold mines make sure that cyanide doesn't escape, by using containment
systems and recycling the water.
Entire operation must be kept on the alkaline side HCN is volatile and
poisonous

ALTERNATIVE PROCESSES
Gold extraction by Mercury. Elemental Hg forms an amalgam with many metals,
such silver and gold.
Mercury boiled off, precious metals remain.
Practised in Central America 1570-1900, and in Brazil and Africa until now.
Extraction via Flotation:
Froth flotation - a process where valuable minerals are separated from
tailing by inducing them to gather on the surface of a froth layer.
This process is based on the ability of certain chemicals to modify the surface
properties of the mineral(s).
Other chemicals are used to generate the froth and still others are used to adjust
the pH.
The process of froth flotation involves crushing and grinding the ore to a
fine size
This separates the individual mineral particles from the waste rock and other
mineral particles.
The grinding is normally done in water with the resultant slurry called the pulp.
The pulp is processed in the flotation cells.
Here the pulp is agitated with a flotation mixture
Fine bubbles are introduced
The ability of a mineral to float depends upon its surface properties.
Chemical modification of these properties enables the mineral particles to attach
to an air bubble.
The air bubble and mineral particles rise through the pulp to the surface of the
froth.
Even though the air bubbles often break at this point, the mineral remains
on the surface of the froth.
The mineral is physically separated from the remaining pulp material and
is removed for further processing.

Crushing
Toxicity of mine tailings

Tailings from copper mines generally have high levels of
copper and other heavy metals.
Tailings derived from gold mining operations often contain
high levels of many types of heavy metal such as arsenic,
cadmium, mercury and lead
Toxicity in the marine environment can also result from the
chemicals that are added in the ore refining process
It is often the case that these chemicals are the most toxic
components of the tailings streams.
Gold mines typically use cyanide - one of the most toxic
chemicals to marine life
Nickel mines often use ammonia in the extraction process
All refining operations use a variety of detergents, frothing
agents and diesel fuel in their operations.
Some are inevitably lost to the environmnet
Submarine Tailings Discharge
(STD)
Aim of STDs - is to deposit mine wastes in deep stratified
waters
It is likely the tailings will be trapped below the mixed surface
layer
They and flow as a dense slurry to a deposition site on the
deep ocean floor.
Recently new mines in the Asia-Pacific region have tended to
discharge tailings at a depth of around 80-100m although
some mines in the Indonesia/Papua New Guinea region
discharge below this level.
It has been often stated by the mining industry that in much
of the Asia-Pacific Region, the land is unsuited to the
construction of tailings dams due to rugged mountains,
regular earthquakes and high rainfall.
These factors increase the likelihood of a disastrous dam
failure.
But as tailings dams require continuous monitoring and post-
mine remediation, STD is also cheaper in the long term.
Typical Submarine Tailings Discharge
STD operation
When tailings leave the STD pipe, the action of
fast moving tailings entering stationary seawater
generates turbulence and mixing.
As a result a 'plume' of turbid, dirty water is formed.
The dirty water from the plume can be expected to
spread for kilometers from the STD outfall.
It may not be possible to see this from the surface, but
100-200m underneath, the water is dirty.
For a certain distance from the outfall, the tailings
flow as a mass, without much mixing (only
slightly) with the surrounding water.
This is because the properties of the tailings are
different from the sea water, both in temperature and
density.
Generally, water bodies with different properties do not
mix well.

STD discharge ideal case
Dangers in STD operation
In STD operations - tailings will enter the sea at
different depths and will spread out for many
kilometers. It is also possible that these tailings
will not mix rapidly with the surrounding water,
so will maintain their high concentrations of
tailings for many kilometers from their source.
A concern - tailings can be carried into the
surface waters through upwelling - a phenomena
common in our region. Upwelling - the movement
of water from the deep sea to the surface layers
can be generated by tides, but is more commonly
induced by winds and currents.
In regions prone to upwelling there is the
potential for catastrophic quantities of tailings to
be carried into the coastal near-shore
environment.

Dangers in STD operation
In different regions there is often the potential for storms
and other gradual processes of to bring tailings back to the
surface.
Recall, that stratification suppresses mixing
Weak pycnocline or storms encourage mixing

It is important to carry out monitoring in waters receiving
mine tailings

The main things to monitor include
water quality
toxicity
benthos and plankton
fish abundance

CASE STUDY OK TEDI MINE IN PNG
Fly River Ok
Tedi Mine Site
Fly River
Fly River Estuary
Before
after
Ok Tedi River - After
Mammoth
trucks dump
80,000 tons of
waste every
day at the edge
of the Ok Tedi
mine in the
Star
Mountains,
forming a huge
heap, then...
The heap of waste is designed to wash into the river as it
rains. This is called an "erodible waste dump". A slurry of
tailings, another kind of mine waste left after the ore is
processed, is also piped directly into the Ok Tedi
catchment.
The murky, waste
laden Ok Tedi runs
down the mountain,
then joins the
larger Fly River.
The slower moving
lowland river allows
the waste to
settle, diverting
the original course
of the river and
forming bars. As
this photo shows,
the river is choked
and boat travel on
the river becomes
difficult or
impossible. The
waste has killed 70
to 90% of the
fish.

Environmental effects on
People who live here rely on fish they
catch in the river mouth and ocean.
There is strong evidence that fish are
made sick by the mine waste, probably
by heavy metals such as copper.
The number of fish caught has dropped
severely.
Much of the waste washes down to the
mouth of the Fly river.


Sedimentation from increased waste rock/tailing
disposal
BEFORE: Fly river carried about 100ppm natural
sediment
NOW: Fly river carries about 450 500ppm
Aggradation build up of sediment in river bed.
This raises the level of river bed.
Increased frequency in flooding of banks,
forest floor buried,
floods have deposited sediments up to 1m.
Flooding causes loss of vegetation
Water logging of sediments causes reduced oxygen levels
in soil
Starving the roots of oxygen, stressing vegetation and
eventually killing them.
Other Environmental effects
During times of
high river water
levels, the mine
waste is
transported up onto
and over the river
banks. At times like
this when the river
backs up into
smaller creeks and
swamps, the waste
goes with it. The
result is thick
layers of sludge
from the mine left
in places which are
normally high and
dry
Effects of increased
sedimentation
The mine waste smothers people's riverbank food gardens,
limiting their capacity to grow food for their families.
It also kills trees and other vegetation wherever it forms a
thick layer over their roots.
This is called "dieback" and affects a large area along the
river system below the mine.
The floatation process extracts 80% copper and 70%
gold rest is discharged in tailings and waste rock.
Flotation chemicals are also discharged
About 80,000 tonnes of tailing and 120,000 tonnes of
waste rock are discharged DAILY
Acid drainage can be a problem
The ore body is a sulphide creating potential for acid
generation in the waste dumps.
This acid can accelerate the release of other metals (for
example lead, zinc, arsenic mercury) from the waste dump
and into ground and surface waters.
The Ok Tedi and Fly rivers are naturally alkaline from
alkaline minerals draining from a predominantly
limestone catchment.
Acidification changes the ricer chemistry and biology.
Toxicity and water quality