PROMT: Philippines Remediation of Mine Tailings

PROMT：菲律宾尾矿修复

• 批准号: NE/W006820/1
• 负责人: Gawen R.T. Jenkin
• 金额: $ 98.43万
• 依托单位: University of Leicester
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2021 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=NE%2FW006820%2F1
• 关键词: PROMT; Philippines; Remediation; Mine; Tailings

We will work with researchers and mining companies in the Philippines to discover new ways to manage metal mine wastes, to clean up pollution, and to make soils to support plant growth and allow the land to be reused. More and more metals are needed for the low carbon technologies to minimise the effects of climate change. The Philippines is the fifth most mineral-rich country in the world and will benefit from this increased demand, but sustainable mining technologies are needed to prevent negative impacts on the environment and surrounding communities. Traditional mining and mineral processing technologies consume large quantities of fresh water, produce CO2, can contaminate water, and compete with local communities for resources. They also produce large amounts of mine waste - uneconomic rock, and wet slurries of finely-ground minerals left over from mineral processing, known as tailings. These are deposited behind constructed dams as tailings storage facilities. It is estimated that in the Philippines about 33 million tonnes of tailings are produced annually - about six times the weight of the Great Pyramid. Tailings storage facilities at both operational and closed mines pose environmental hazards; failure could cause contaminated materials to be released affecting people and ecosystems. The risk of failure is increased in the Philippines, due to the rugged topography, high rainfall, and frequent earthquakes.Our research project will investigate new sustainable technologies to minimise the environmental hazards of mine tailings. We will apply our research to both nickel and copper-gold mines which make up 99% of the value of metallic minerals mined in the Philippines. Our project brings together three science areas that are vital for innovation: (1) we will show how tailings storage facilities can be monitored in real time to allow reactive management to environmental changes; to achieve this we will use emerging technology in geophysical tomography and remote sensing to monitor and understand tailings behaviour in 4D (2) we will investigate novel environmentally-benign solvents as a new method to dissolve metals from modern and abandoned tailings and test their application at mine sites; this will allow more metals to be recovered with economic value and also benefit tailings management by decontaminating hazardous components (3) we will study how plants and microbes colonise mine wastes, how this is affected by the use of solvents, and identify the best ways to promote biological growth. This will not only rehabilitate the land and allow it to be reused for agriculture or wildlife, it also minimises environmental hazards by improving the stability of the tailings and decreasing their toxicity.Whilst these approaches have been applied separately in other settings, this will be the first time that they have been used in combination to address the pressing issue of tailings remediation. By integrating these novel approaches we will find synergies that will deliver a step-change in innovation and enable us to achieve our ambition of sustainable tailings management. The outcomes, impacts and benefits of this research will be to decrease impacts from tailings to local communities and the environment, improved social license to operate for mining companies, reduced long term liabilities and risks from abandoned sites, and potential sources of revenue by recovery of additional metals and land re-use.

我们将与菲律宾的研究人员和矿业公司合作，探索管理金属矿山废物、清理污染、使土壤支持植物生长并使土地得到再利用的新方法。低碳技术需要越来越多的金属，以最大限度地减少气候变化的影响。菲律宾是世界上第五大矿产资源丰富的国家，将受益于这一需求的增加，但需要可持续的采矿技术来防止对环境和周围社区的负面影响。传统的采矿和矿物加工技术消耗大量的淡水，产生二氧化碳，可能污染水，并与当地社区争夺资源。它们还产生大量的矿山废物--不经济的岩石，以及矿物加工过程中留下的细磨矿物的湿泥浆，称为尾矿。这些尾矿堆积在已建的水坝后面，作为尾矿储存设施。据估计，菲律宾每年产生约3300万吨尾矿，约为大金字塔重量的六倍。运营中的和关闭的矿山的尾矿储存设施都对环境造成危害;故障可能导致受污染材料的释放，影响到人和生态系统。由于菲律宾地形崎岖，降雨量高，地震频繁，失败的风险增加。我们的研究项目将研究新的可持续技术，以尽量减少尾矿的环境危害。我们将把我们的研究应用于镍和铜金矿，这些矿占菲律宾金属矿开采价值的99%。我们的项目汇集了对创新至关重要的三个科学领域：（1）我们将展示如何对尾矿储存设施进行真实的实时监测，以实现对环境变化的反应式管理;为了实现这一目标，我们将使用地球物理层析成像和遥感方面的新兴技术来监测和了解4D（2）中的尾矿行为，我们将调查新的环境-作为一种新方法的良性溶剂，从现代废弃尾矿中溶解金属，并测试其在矿场的应用;这将允许更多的金属以经济价值被回收，并且还通过净化有害成分而有益于尾矿管理（3）我们将研究植物和微生物如何在矿山废物中繁殖，这是如何受到溶剂的使用，并确定最好的方式来促进生物生长。这不仅可以恢复土地并使其重新用于农业或野生动物，还可以通过提高尾矿的稳定性和降低其毒性来最大限度地减少环境危害。虽然这些方法已经在其他环境中单独应用，但这将是第一次将它们结合起来用于解决尾矿修复的紧迫问题。通过整合这些新方法，我们将发现协同效应，这将带来创新的飞跃，并使我们能够实现可持续尾矿管理的雄心。这项研究的成果、影响和效益将减少尾矿对当地社区和环境的影响，改善采矿公司的社会经营许可，减少废弃场地的长期负债和风险，并通过回收额外的金属和土地再利用来获得潜在的收入来源。

项目成果

Species-specific effects of mycorrhizal symbiosis on Populus trichocarpa after a lethal dose of copper

• DOI: 10.1016/j.ecoenv.2024.116112
• 发表时间: 2024-02-13
• 期刊: ECOTOXICOLOGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL SAFETY
• 影响因子: 6.8
• 作者: Soltangheisi，Amin;Hales-Henao，Aysha;Tibbett，Mark
• 通讯作者: Tibbett，Mark

The extent and applications of metal accumulation and hyperaccumulation in Philippine plants

• DOI: 10.1071/bt23070
• 发表时间: 2023-01-01
• 期刊: AUSTRALIAN JOURNAL OF BOTANY
• 影响因子: 1.1
• 作者: Duddigan，Sarah;Quimado，Marilyn O.;Cook，Garry
• 通讯作者: Cook，Garry

Evolution of Sulfidic Legacy Mine Tailings: A Review of the Wheal Maid Site, UK

硫化物遗留尾矿的演变：英国 Wheal Maid 遗址回顾

• DOI: 10.3390/min12070848
• 发表时间: 2022
• 期刊: Minerals
• 影响因子: 2.5
• 作者: Fitch V

Geosciences and the Energy Transition

• DOI: 10.3389/esss.2023.10072
• 发表时间: 2023-07
• 期刊: Ecological Indicators
• 影响因子: 6.9
• 作者: N. Gardiner;J. Roberts;G. Johnson;Daniel J. Smith;C. Bond;R. Knipe;S. Haszeldine;Sarah Gordon;M. O'Donnell