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Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry

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A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Resources and Sustainable Utilization".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2022) | Viewed by 19059

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Dmitriy Makarov

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Guest Editor

Institute of North Industrial Ecology Problems, Russian Academy of Sciences, 184209 Apatity, Russia
Interests: minerals; mining; heavy metals; environmental pollution; wastewater treatment

Dr. Vladimir Masloboev

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Guest Editor

Institute of North Industrial Ecology Problems, Russian Academy of Sciences, 184209 Apatity, Russia
Interests: minerals; hydrometallurgical processes; materials science; rare earth elements; heavy metals; environmental pollution; wastewater treatment

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Mining industry waste attracts the attention of both researchers and operators from the point of view of both the environment and resource base.

The huge amount of accumulated overburden and concentration tailings lead to serious economic and environmental challenges in mining regions. Keeping overburden dumps and tailings storage facilities environmentally safe requires significant investment. These sites render large areas of land economically unusable for a long time. Large volumes of displaced rock mass disrupt the existing geological balance, gas and dust emissions from mining operations, dusting of dumps and tailings, and the seepage of reagents and heavy metals into surface and ground water adversely affect ecosystems and human health. These impacts are especially dangerous in regions with extreme climatic conditions, for example, in the Subarctic, where vast industrial wastelands surrounding mining sites have developed. Changes in the composition and properties of minerals during storage of mining waste proceed much faster than in a natural geological setting.

On the other hand, given the scale of the loss of valuable minerals during the concentration process, the depletion of mineral reserves, and the declining ore grade, mining waste is considered a potential source of useful minerals, despite the lower grade compared to primary mineral feeds. Moreover, primary feeds require significantly lower mining and processing costs. In the process of storage, due to the differentiation by size and density, pockets enriched with ore minerals (anthropogenic deposits) can form. Ore reserves in anthropogenic deposits are presently comparable to those of primary ores. For the cost-effective processing of mining waste, new processes need to be designed and implemented.

The main topics of the special issue are:

Monitoring of the state of the environment in the zones affected by mining sites.
Combined concentration and hydrometallurgical methods and biotechnology in the processing of ore, tailings, and slags.
Obtaining of building materials and environmental materials (sorbents, ameliorants, binders, etc.) from mining waste.
Treatment methods for the mining industry’s wastewater to remove heavy metals, fluorine, sulfates, oil products, etc.
Reclamation methods for disturbed ecosystems and bioremediation methods for mining waste dumps.
Assessment of mining industry impact on the surrounding population health.

Dr. Dmitriy Makarov
Dr. Vladimir Masloboev
Guest Editors

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Keywords

mining waste
mining industry’s wastewater
recovery of valuable minerals
building materials from mining waste
treatment of wastewater
reclamation and bioremediation methods

Published Papers (9 papers)

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Research

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19 pages, 3748 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Spatio-Temporal Analysis about Resource and Environmental Carrying Capacity (RECC) of Mining Cities in Coal-Concentrated Areas: A Case Study of Huaihai Economic Zone in China

by Shuai Tong, Xiang Ji, Yun Chu, Tianlong Liu and Fengyu Wang

Sustainability 2023, 15(2), 1367; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15021367 - 11 Jan 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1109

Abstract

The over-exploitation and utilization of natural resources in mining cities has caused sharp contradictions between urban development and ecological protection. In addition, dynamic changes in resources and environmental carrying capacity (RECC) will be changed by the different ways and degrees of the specific utilization of natural resources. In order to better study the dynamic trends and reasons of the RECC in mining cities, so as to provide methods and suggestions for the mining cities to save resources, improve the ecology, and adjust the industrial structure, this article will construct an evaluation index for the RECC of mining cities. Taking Huaihai Economic Zone as the research object, we used the entropy method to determine the index weight. Then, the TOPSIS model was used to analyze the spatial and temporal characteristics of the development of the RECC of mining cities in coal-concentrated areas during 2012–2018. After the analysis, the study found five results. (1) Except Zaozhuang, the RECC of the six mining cities in the Huaihai Economic Zone showed a steady upward trend during 2012–2018; (2) among the three subsystems, natural resources have the greatest impact on the RECC; (3) in terms of space, the carrying capacity in this region gradually has a polarization phenomenon centered on Xuzhou and Jining, and will continue to increase in the future; (4) the types of mining cities will have an impact on the change characteristics of the RECC; and (5) most cities improve the level of ecological carrying capacity (ECC) and social economic carrying capacity (SECC) at the cost of the decline of resources carrying capacity (RCC). Based on the results, the research can provide optimized reference strategies for the transformation and development of mining cities to ecological cities in Huaihai Economic Zone. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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12 pages, 1981 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Effect of Water Treatment on the Chemical Composition of Drinking Water: A Case of Lovozero, Murmansk Region, Russia

by Svetlana Mazukhina, Svetlana Drogobuzhskaya, Sergey Sandimirov and Vladimir Masloboev

Sustainability 2022, 14(24), 16996; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142416996 - 19 Dec 2022

Viewed by 1674

Abstract

The surface waters in Russia’s Murmansk Region used for public water supply are exposed to the negative impact of dust particles carried from the storage facilities for mining waste. For example, lanthanides and other rare metals enter the surface waters in Lovozero District from the tailings storage facilities (TSFs) of the Lovozero Concentrator, which requires thorough water treatment of drinking water. Using the monitoring data of the natural water of the Virma River and of the tap water in the residential community of Lovozero, Murmansk Region, and with the help of physical and chemical modeling (in the software suite Selector), we examined the effect of reagents used in water treatment on water chemistry. It was shown that the use of aluminum polyoxydichloride coagulant can lead to an increase in the concentration of aluminum and chlorine in water, a change in pH and Eh values. The use of liquid chlorine leads to a decrease in pH values and a change in the concentration of HCO₃⁻, which entails a change in the forms of migration of calcium and lanthanides in solution. The composition of the precipitated phases changed, which indicates a change in the water chemistry, demonstrating that the applied water treatment technology adopted in Lovozero fails to improve water quality. It was shown that replacing liquid chlorine (a hazardous reagent) with NaOCl optimized the water treatment process, eliminating the need to stabilize the pH by adding sodium. Physical and chemical modeling was found to be useful for studying and optimizing water treatment processes. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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17 pages, 1291 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Pollution-Induced Changes in the Composition of Atmospheric Deposition and Soil Waters in Coniferous Forests at the Northern Tree Line

by Vyacheslav Ershov, Tatyana Sukhareva, Ludmila Isaeva, Ekaterina Ivanova and Gennadii Urbanavichus

Sustainability 2022, 14(23), 15580; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142315580 - 23 Nov 2022

Viewed by 990

Abstract

This study examines the dynamics of the composition of atmospheric precipitation and soil water in coniferous forests under the influence of atmospheric emissions from the Severonickel Copper–Nickel Smelter in Russia’s Murmansk region. We studied dwarf shrub-green moss spruce forests and lichen-shrub pine forests, the most common in the boreal zone. Our results showed a significant intra- (below and between the crowns) and inter-biogeocenotic (spruce and pine forests) variation in the composition of atmospheric precipitation and soil water in forests exposed to air pollution. The concentrations of main pollutants in atmospheric fallout and soil water are tens (sulfates) and hundreds (heavy metals) times higher than in the background areas and typically higher below the crowns. The long-term dynamics (between 1999 and 2020) of the composition of atmospheric fallout and soil water in coniferous forests in the background areas and defoliating forests demonstrates a significant increase in nickel concentrations in recent years. This may be due to an increase in nickel concentrations in aerosols propagating over considerable distances. In pollution-induced sparse forests, a trend was found toward a decrease in the concentration of pollutants, which may indicate a decrease in the fallout of pollutants in the composition of larger particles close to the smelter. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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10 pages, 8940 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Study of Lawn Vegetation under the Influence of Mining and Processing Enterprise Activity in the Climatic Conditions of the Arctic Zone

by Andrey Goryachev, Tatiana Mingaleva, Alena Kompanchenko, Dmitriy Makarov and Vladimir Masloboev

Sustainability 2022, 14(18), 11655; https://doi.org/10.3390/su141811655 - 16 Sep 2022

Viewed by 1287

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine the vegetation dynamics of various lawn grass species in the city of Apatity, Murmansk region, when exposed to anthropogenic and atmospheric pollution impacts. The dust concentration in the atmospheric air was recorded, its mineralogical analysis was carried out, and the dynamics of the development of various lawn types under the anthropogenic load was studied. Cases of exceeding the MPC of dust particles in the atmospheric air were recorded. Nepheline grains were found in the dust samples, which is indicative of pollution migration from the nearby tailings storage facility. It was shown that lawns are able to grow intensively in severe climatic conditions and under the influence of mining and processing enterprises. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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19 pages, 6911 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Comprehensive Evaluation of the Eco-Geological Environment in the Concentrated Mining Area of Mineral Resources

by Chenyang Wu, Yichen Zhang, Jiquan Zhang, Yanan Chen, Chenyu Duan, Jiawei Qi, Zhongshuai Cheng and Zengkai Pan

Sustainability 2022, 14(11), 6808; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14116808 - 2 Jun 2022

Cited by 15 | Viewed by 2070

Abstract

The urbanization rate in China has been increasing in recent years, and along with the increasing intensity of human engineering activities, ecological and geological (eco-geological) degradation have become key factors impeding sustainable urban development. Taking the concentrated mineral exploitation area of Tonghua City as an example, the distribution of mines in the area is concentrated and the spatial heterogeneity is significant. This paper includes 14 evaluation indicators in three aspects: eco-geological environment background, anthropogenic and mining engineering activities, and environmental pollution. Then, based on game theory combined with ANP-CV (Analytic Network Process and Coefficient of Variation), two empowerment methods, GIS spatial calculation is used to evaluate the eco-geological environment quality (EEQ). The results showed that the EEQ was divided into grades I–V from high to low, with areas of 21.13%, 30.35%, 27.00%, 14.30%, and 7.22%, respectively; the EEQ of the Hun River basin has a high spatial autocorrelation and low EEQ, and the EEQ grade of mines was divided on this basis; the hot spot analysis is useful for determining the EEQ, as well as for allocating mine restoration resources in a sensible manner. Finally, we propose countermeasures to improve EEQ, and this study can provide a scientific basis for ecological construction and geological environmental protection in Tonghua City. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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15 pages, 6881 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Life Cycle Assessment of Boron Industry from Mining to Refined Products

by Tuğçe Türkbay, Bertrand Laratte, Ayşenur Çolak, Semra Çoruh and Birol Elevli

Sustainability 2022, 14(3), 1787; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031787 - 4 Feb 2022

Cited by 8 | Viewed by 4082

Abstract

Although there are a lot of studies in literature related to the life cycle assessment (LCA) of mining, there are only a few studies done on the boron mining industry. This paper presents an LCA of the boron mining industry including the extraction, beneficiation, and refinement processes. The main purpose is to identify and compare the environmental impacts associated with the production of 1 ton of refined products (boric acid, borax pentahydrate, borax decahydrate, and sodium perborate) starting from an open pit mine located in Turkey. The life cycle inventory (LCI) was obtained from the data collected from the related literature sources and the company’s reports. This cradle-to-gate analysis has been carried out using the commercial software called SimaPro employing the International Reference Life Cycle Data System (ILCD) 2011 Midpoint+ Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) method. The results showed that the environmental impact of the refinement process is critical compared to the mining and beneficiations processes. Sulphuric acid, steam, hydrogen peroxide, and sodium perborate which are used in refined boron production cause most of the impact and emission into the environment. Among the refined boron products investigated, the impact of sodium perborate is quite high. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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14 pages, 5856 KiB

Open AccessEditor’s ChoiceArticle

Land Cover and Vegetation Coverage Changes in the Mining Area—A Case Study from Slovakia

by Stefan Kuzevic, Diana Bobikova and Zofia Kuzevicova

Sustainability 2022, 14(3), 1180; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031180 - 20 Jan 2022

Cited by 15 | Viewed by 2296

Abstract

Dealing with landscape changes in space and time is an important activity in terms of the process of future development of the selected area. In particular, it is necessary to focus on territories that are exposed to the effects of extraction activities. The main objective of the paper was the mapping of spatio-temporal changes in the landscape in connection with the extraction of minerals due to mining activities on the landscape using satellite images and data from the Corine land cover (CLC) database in the environment of geographic information systems. The selected study area is specific to the presence of four mineral deposits (three of which are under active mining). The Rohožník-Konopiská deposit was abandoned and the area was subsequently reclaimed. The study used Corine land cover (CLC) data and Landsat 5, 7, 8 satellite images for selected years in the period 1990–2021. The Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) was calculated for vegetation cover analysis, which was further combined with the forest spatial division units (FSDU) layer. Areas in the immediate vicinity of the open-pit mine were selected for detailed analysis of vegetation changes. Using the FSDU data, an average NDVI index value was calculated using the Zonal statistics function for each plot. The results showed that over the selected period there have been changes indicating an improvement in the landscape condition by reclamation operations at two deposits, Rohožník-Konopiská (inactive) and Sološnica-Hrabník (active). The analyzed CLC data detected the change at the Rohožník-Konopiská deposit, but the active deposit Sološnica-Hrabník was not detected in these data. The loss of vegetation on the other two deposits is mainly due to pre-mining preparatory work, which causes the removal of soil and vegetation layers. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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Review

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14 pages, 3340 KiB

Open AccessReview

Contemporary Research and Developments in the Low-Toxic Chelating Reagents for the Extraction of Non-Ferrous and Noble Metals from Poor Polymetallic Ores and Processing Tailings

by Tamara N. Matveeva, Viktoriya V. Getman, Nadezhda K. Gromova and Anna Yu. Karkeshkina

Sustainability 2022, 14(23), 16262; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142316262 - 6 Dec 2022

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1591

Abstract

An urgent technological, economic and environmental task of mining and metallurgical enterprises is to involve poor, off-balance and hard-to-beneficiate ores in the technological process, as well as accumulated and current waste from mining and metallurgical industries. As the reserves of developed deposits are depleted, technogenic objects may become a priority, and in some cases the only, source of mineral raw materials. Mining wastes represent a large reserve of raw materials for the extraction of non-ferrous and precious metals, and at the same time, they are centers of local or regional environmental pollution. Stale waste re-processing may promote territorial cultivation and reduce the environmental burden. The conventional methods of poor ore and waste treatment do not fully provide for a sufficient separation degree of high metal extraction, and lead to significant valuable ore losses, while the quality of the obtained concentrates often does not meet the requirements for subsequent technological process. In this regard, the development of novel chelating agents with specific functional groups that can selectively adsorb on the mineral surface, change the contrast of chemical surface composition and improve the flotation properties of mineral complexes, is an innovative solution for increasing their flotation selectivity. Furthermore, the synthesis and application of novel flotation reagents may help to replace toxic reagents by ecologically friendly or less-toxic ones. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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23 pages, 811 KiB

Open AccessReview

Electrochemistry of Sulfides: Process and Environmental Aspects

by Valentine A. Chanturiya, Eugenia A. Krasavtseva and Dmitriy V. Makarov

Sustainability 2022, 14(18), 11285; https://doi.org/10.3390/su141811285 - 8 Sep 2022

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2665

Abstract

One of the main sources of non-ferrous and precious metals is sulfide ores. This paper presents a review of the existing literature on the electrochemical properties of some of the most common industrial sulfides, such as pentlandite, chalcopyrite, sphalerite, galena, pyrrhotite, pyrite, etc. The study results of the surface redox transformations of minerals, galvanic effect, cathodic oxygen reduction reaction on the surface of sulfides are presented. The electrochemical properties of sulfide minerals are manifested both in the industrial processes of flotation and hydrometallurgy and in the natural geological setting or during the storage of sulfide-containing mining, mineral processing, and metallurgical industry waste. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Resource Utilization and Environmental Protection in Mining Industry)

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