Forestry and Mining Operations: Pollution Tutorial (2024)

FAQs

What are the 7 environmental impacts of mining? ›

Some examples of the negative environmental impacts of mining include climate change, deforestation/habitat destruction, pollution, soil erosion, human-wildlife conflict, and the loss of biodiversity.

Abandoned mining operations can leach iron and other chemicals such as copper, lead and mercury into nearby waterbodies. Active mining operations are considered point sources of pollution. But drainage or runoff from abandoned mining operations often adds to nonpoint source pollution.

Selective Mining: Selective mining involves extracting only high-grade materials, leaving lower-grade ones in place. This approach reduces waste generation and decreases the amount of material that needs to be processed, minimizing the overall environmental impact.

The major potential environmental impacts associated with mining and associated mineral processing operations are related to erosion-prone landscapes, soil and water quality, and air quality.

Mining can cause erosion, sinkholes, loss of biodiversity, or the contamination of soil, groundwater, and surface water by chemicals emitted from mining processes. These processes also affect the atmosphere through carbon emissions which contributes to climate change.

Green mining embraces innovative techniques, like in-situ recovery and bioleaching, which minimize surface disruption and reduce the environmental footprint. These methods are particularly useful for extracting minerals from ore bodies that are hard to access through traditional means.

Every stage of the mining process, including the ore extraction, generation of solid waste, and ore refining and processing, creates air pollution that has environmental and public health impacts.”

The mining industry has identified several ways to build sustainability into mining. Implementing sustainable practices: Tailing reuses extracted residual metals from previous mining projects, minimizing waste and impact. Additionally, ensuring waste is managed safely and efficiently can prevent disasters.

How does mining pollution affect humans? ›

Living in heavily mined areas increases the risk of lung cancer and respiratory disease. Levels of exposure to pollution are highest in areas with the most mountaintop removal. Scientists found a direct link between dust from mountaintop removal and lung cancer.

To minimize the environmental impact of mining operations, adopting sustainable practices, prioritizing energy efficiency through renewable sources, implementing water conservation and waste reduction measures, and engaging in responsible community involvement are essential.

Waste can be reduced by reprocessing to extract additional minerals and using waste for construction purposes in mines. Mine waste can also be reused in several industries. For instance, in the construction industry, mine waste can be used as aggregates in asphalt or building materials such as concrete.

Slag Reprocessing Methods

Mining slag can also be reprocessed to recover low-grade ores using hydrometallurgy techniques. A study used sulfuric acid to cause the leaching and concentration of zinc and iron from the waste material in an old lead and zinc mine in Turkey.

The major components of the environment are - natural (land, air, water, living things), man-made (buildings, parks, bridges, roads, industries, monuments, etc) and humans (individual, family, community, religion, educational, economic, etc).

The most common and significant environmental impact are discharges to soil and watercourses. Often the most significant environmental impact from mining activities are discharges of metals and other elements to soil as well as surface and ground water. The impact of discharges differs from element to element.

Mining changes the environment. Extracting minerals from the ground will change the landscape, alter water quality, change the local ecology, and change land use. To what extent the environment is impacted depends on several things.