The environmental impact of mining on the ecosystem, including land, water and air, has become an unavoidable reality. Guidelines and regulations have been promulgated to protect the environment throughout mining activities from start-up to site decommissioning, in particular, the occurrence of acid mine drainage (AMD), due to oxidation of sulfide mineral wastes, has become the major area of ...
Lemna minor, a free‐floating macrophyte, is used for bio‐monitoring of mine effluent quality under the Metal Mining Effluent Regulations (MMER) of the Environmental Effects Monitoring (EEM) program in Canada, and is known to be sensitive to trace metals commonly discharged in mine effluents such as nickel. Environment Canada's standard toxicity testing protocol recommends frond count (FC) and ...
A new hybrid process for cleaning wastewater, combining flotation and membrane microfiltration, was investigated. The hybrid process combined the advantages of both flotation and membrane separation: the flotation cell removed a large proportion of suspended solid particles, while the membrane module produced clean water permeate effluent. The hybrid cell performance has been studied in depth and ...
New Logic International installed its Vibratory Shear Enhanced Processing (VSEP) system in March, 1998 at a major California rare earth mining and manufacturing facility. The VSEP is used for treatment of mine tailing pond effluent at this facility with no pretreatment required. The VSEP system uses nanofiltration followed by ultrafiltration membrane modules and is able to treat the mine tailing ...
The Antas Reservoir (AR) receives treated effluents coming from the acid drainage of uranium ore from the Ore Treatment Unit?Brazilian Nuclear Industries (UTM-INB) plant located in Caldas, Minas Gerais, Brazil. This study was conducted in order to determine the possible radioecological impact caused by discharges of the treated liquid effluent from the UTM into the reservoir. Biological and ...
Stantec Consulting Ltd. (Stantec) was retained in March 2006 by Williams Operating Corporation (WOC) to perform an optimization study of mining wastewater treatment at the WOC facility in Marathon, Ontario. The primary objectives of this optimization study were i) to identify potential opportunities to optimize the treatment system in order to reduce chemical costs; ii) to identify mechanisms of ...
With the development of mining, smelting and other industrial activities, heavy metals are increasingly being found in freshwater sources which can pose severe threats to human and environmental health. Pollution by heavy metals (such as Cd, Pb, etc.) not only affects the productivity of crops, but also the quality of the atmosphere as well as water bodies and threatens the health and life of ...
The Metal Mining Effluent Regulations (MMER) took effect in 2002 and require most metal mining operations in Canada to complete Environmental Effects Monitoring (EEM) programs. An “effect” under the MMER EEM program is considered any positive or negative statistically significant difference in fish population, fish usability, or benthic invertebrate community EEM‐defined endpoints. Two ...
Starting today, Nick Tandi and Anton Earle from SIWI’s African Regional Centre, the 2030 Water Resources Group (2030 WRG) and the South African Ministry for Water will host a week-long knowledge exchange trip to Pretoria, South Africa. The knowledge exchange places emphasis on private sector engagement in multi-stakeholder partnerships related to mining and to finding solutions for water ...
This work assessed the potential of nanofiltration (NF) and reverse osmosis (RO) to treat acid streams contaminated with metals, such as effluent from the pressure oxidation process (POX) used in refractory gold ore processing. NF and RO were evaluated in terms of rejections of sulfuric acid and metals. Regarding NF, high sulfuric acid permeation (∼100%), was observed, while metals were ...
In the Iberian Pyrite Belt (IPB), southwest Spain, a prolonged and intense mining activity of more than 4,500 years has resulted in almost a hundred mines scattered through the region. After years of inactivity, these mines are still causing high levels of hydrochemical degradation in the fluvial network. This situation represents a unique scenario in the world, taking into consideration its ...
Because increased ionic strength has caused deleterious ecological changes in freshwater streams, thresholds for effects are needed to inform resource‐management decisions. In particular, effluents from surface coal mining raise the ionic strength of receiving streams. The authors developed an aquatic life benchmark for specific conductance as a measure of ionic strength that is expected to ...
Groundwater pollution may occur due to human activities, industrial effluents, cemeteries, mine spoils, etc. This paper deals with one-dimensional mathematical modeling of solute transport in finite aquifers. The governing equation for solute transport by unsteady groundwater flow is solved analytically by the Laplace transform technique. Initially, the aquifer is subjected to the spatially ...
Freshwater resources are protected as industry begins to put emphasis on sustainability The mining industry has a great impact on water resources, both depleting water supplies with high usage and polluting them with discharges or seepage from tailings or waste rock impoundments. To put the scale of industry in perspective, according to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), 4 billion ...
Evaporation ponds are widely used to reduce the total volume of water that must be withdrawn, treated, and discharged. Freshwater resources are protected as industry begins to put emphasis on sustainability The mining industry has a great impact on water resources, both depleting water supplies with high usage and polluting them with discharges or seepage from tailings or waste rock ...
Abstract The high demand on water resources and landfills resulting from increased industrialization and population growth are problems facing the global community. With the environmental regulations becoming increasingly more stringent, there is a growing need for more efficient and cost effective methods to abatement. An innovative approach to the treatment of industrial wastewater to meet the ...
Mining waste comprises different types of rock, overburden, slurry and tailings from the processes of excavation and dressing. Further physical and chemical processing of a wide range of materials create additional waste from mining operations. Therefore, mine wastewater treatment is required, in order to avoid the contamination of the surrounding environment.This guide aims to explain ...
Dissolved radionuclides in the effluent of uranium mining industry were studied. Activity concentrations of uranium and radium were estimated in effluent water from different uranium mines and mill tailings ponds. The concentrations of U and 226Ra in untreated effluent water were found to be elevated. The concentrations of dissolved radionuclides in the adjacent aquatic streams and river were ...
In mining-industrial-urban areas, the variability of river discharge is regulated, directly or indirectly, by human economic activity. This results from the presence of alien water, which often comes from outside the catchment area, is discharged into the river network. This water includes industrial and municipal wastewater and deep-drainage mine water. Simultaneously, as a result of water ...
Water is a finite resource. Its safety and cleanliness are highly important to meet current and future human needs. Compared to other resources, water represents a main factor to achieve development in several areas and leads to economic progress of a nation. However, in recent years, the excessive demographic and industrial growth has exacerbated water contamination. In this study, the ...