PROMT: Philippines Remediation of Mine Tailings

我们已经组建了一个由菲律宾和英国的跨学科研究人员和行业合作伙伴组成的团队，以建立一个创新的研究计划，以测试可持续的尾矿管理、补救和修复。我们的雄心是生产耗水量更少、稳定性更高的尾矿，并展示如何对其进行实时监控和适应性管理；以及能够对现代和遗留尾矿进行加工，以回收更多金属，同时对它们进行净化，鼓励相关生态系统服务的修复和长期稳定和再利用。这项综合研究的潜在结果、影响和好处将是减少尾矿对社区和环境的影响，更好地遵守国际标准，改善采矿公司的社会经营许可证，减少遗留地点的长期负债和风险，以及通过二次开采更多金属和土地再利用的潜在收入来源。世界正在转向低碳经济，需要从采矿中获得更多和更多种类的金属。菲律宾是世界上矿产资源第五丰富的国家，因此将从这一增长的需求中受益。然而，地雷会对环境和周围社区产生负面影响。采矿和矿物加工消耗和污染水；产生大量二氧化碳足迹；并与当地社区争夺土地和生态系统服务。它们还会产生废物--大量的岩石和加工过程中遗留下来的湿矿浆，称为尾矿。最近尾矿储存设施(TSF)故障造成的灾难给运营和遗留TSF的管理带来了额外的审查。在菲律宾，地形崎岖，包括台风在内的高降雨量，以及经常发生的地震事件，TSF仍然面临失败的风险，并继续向下游排放受污染的水。这些问题不仅影响正在运营的矿山--废弃或关闭矿场遗留的尾矿是长期的环境危害。只有创新，才能实现TSF管理的新的可持续标准。通过我们提议的大型项目，我们将提供支持此类创新的基础科学，整合地球物理断层扫描监测、环境友好溶剂、原位再处理、工程纳米材料、地球微生物学、植物修复、土壤开发和材料特性等领域的跨学科专业知识和新想法。我们的伙伴关系和项目开发赠款目标是：1.确定执行项目工作的最佳现场地点，并确保访问和许可的安全。这将包括审查菲律宾的金属植物(耐金属植物，有时还包括金属积累植物)；菲律宾的矿石、矿山废料和尾矿；对尾矿进行现场地球物理监测所需的参数以及浸出液的流动方式进行模拟。通过以下方式完善利益攸关方参与的项目：检查涉及的不同技术及其相互作用并制定方法；探索合作伙伴可用的设施和能力，并确定知识交流和能力建设的机会；制定管理计划；完善我们的团队。与一系列非矿业利益相关者进行接触，以了解他们的需求，并从战略上传达我们的项目目标和影响。与其他PPD项目联网。研究远程协作的新方法和技术。

We have assembled a team of interdisciplinary Philippine and UK researchers and industrial partners to build an innovative research programme to test sustainable tailings management, remediation and rehabilitation. Our ambitions are to produce tailings with less water consumption and greater stability and show how they can be monitored and adaptively managed in real time; and to enable the processing of modern and legacy tailings to recover more metals, whilst decontaminating them, encouraging rehabilitation and long-term stabilisation and re-use of the associated ecosystem services. The potential outcomes, impacts and benefits of this integrated research will be reduced community and environmental impacts from tailings, greater compliance with international standards, improved social license to operate for mining companies, reduced long term liabilities and risks from legacy sites, and potential sources of revenue by secondary extraction of additional metals and land re-use.The world is moving to a low carbon economy that requires a greater amount and variety of metals from mining. The Philippines is the fifth most mineral-rich country in the world and therefore stands to benefit from this increased demand. However, mines can negatively impact on the environment and surrounding communities. Mining and mineral processing consume and contaminate water; have a large CO2 footprint; and compete with local communities for land and ecosystem services. They also produce waste - uneconomic volumes of rock, and wet slurries of finely-ground minerals left over from processing, known as tailings in large quantities.Recent disasters caused by the failure of tailings storage facilities (TSF) have brought extra scrutiny to the management of operational and legacy TSF. In the Philippines, with rugged topography, high rainfall including typhoons, and regular seismic events, TSF remain at risk of failure, and continue to discharge contaminated water downstream. These issues not only affect operational mines - legacy tailings at abandoned or closed mine sites are persistent environmental hazards. Only with innovation will new sustainable standards for TSF management be achieved. Through our proposed large project, we will deliver the fundamental science to underpin such innovation, integrating interdisciplinary expertise and novel ideas in the fields of geophysical tomographic monitoring, environmentally-benign solvents, in situ reprocessing, engineered nanomaterials, geomicrobiology, phytoremediation, soil development and materials characterisation.Our Partnership and Project Development grant objectives are to:1. Identify the optimum field sites in which to perform the project work and secure access and permissions. This will include reviews of Philippines metallophytes (metal-tolerant and sometimes metal accumulating plants); Philippine ores, mine waste materials and tailings; and modelling the parameters needed for in situ geophysical monitoring of tailings and how leaching fluids will flow.2. Refine the project involving stakeholders through: Examining the different technologies involved and their interactions and develop methodologies; Exploring the facilities and capabilities available at partners and identifying opportunities for knowledge exchange and capacity building; Developing a management plan; Completing our team.3. Carry out engagement with a range of non-mining stakeholders to understand their needs and to strategically communicate our project aims and impact.4. Network with other PPD projects.5. Examine novel approaches and technologies for remote collaboration.