Holy Grail of mining in sight

The Holy Grail of mining is in sight from Queensland University. Scientists at the Sustainable Minerals Institute are embracing the concept of no-waste production. Environmental Geologist Dr Anita Parbhakar-Fox has been working on minimising mining impacts through waste characterisation since the mid-00s. Dr Anita Parbhakar Fox and Dr Laura Jackson onsite Dr Parbhakar-Fox describes waste is a ‘design flaw’ in mine planning at the same time citing cases where the market was encouraging remining. “Silica can be recovered and used in glass manufacturing.” “If you've got non-sulfide gangue materials populated in your tailings storage facility or waste dump, you could potentially separate them out and use individual waste streams in aggregates or construction industries. “Iron oxides you can recover and use in pigments. Even mica you can recover and use in mineral makeup, which is a billion-dollar industry in itself.” Public image turn around for mining Dr Parbhakar-Fox says the emphasis on new mining methods has the potential to capture the community’s imagination and turn around the image of mining as a dirty industry. “I think there's a lot of appetite, thinking about the billions of tons of materials that sit on the surface as a consequence of mining. “In terms of thinking about green credentials that Millennials and Gen-Z types of people have, it certainly speaks to their core ethics to actually engage in recycling these materials rather than seeking primary resources. “There's a lot to be gained from thinking about the way that is a design-flaw-type philosophy.” Re-mining Research in hard rock areas There are hundreds of historic mine sites in Queensland and the Sustainable Minerals Institute has investigated 15 that are either redundant or in care and maintenance for the potential to process waste dumps. Tailings taken from Mount Garnet They include Rocklands near Cloncurry, Mount Garnet on the Atherton Tablelands and an abandoned gold mine on Horn Island in Torres Strait. The project is funded by the Geological Survey of Queensland under the New Economy Minerals Initiative. Consistent results in Horn Island extension drilling ‘A lot of the waste rock is quite well endowed in gold (on the Horn Island site), and from our sampling on average, it was about 6.4 grams per ton,’ says Dr Parbhakar Fox. Mine waste dump on Horn Island “That's an interesting site right there on this Island because the main waste rock dump is co-located with the operating municipal waste dump. “We'd obviously have to think about how we would manage the relationship with the local council to actually access the deeper portions of the dump to collect samples that are more representative across the entire site. “Certainly, I would say keeping this running as a municipal dump is an opportunity wasted. Based on our sampling this dump is more like a low-grade gold deposit.” She says, ‘the future of the mining industry is in reducing the waste, reducing the environmental footprint and optimizing the resources at home.’ That’s the Holy Grail.

Holy Grail of mining in sight

Industry Queensland

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