Fabric, rheology, and shear strength for risk reduction in tailings impoundment management

造成灾难性后果的尾矿库坍塌事件时有发生。2015年在巴西和2014年在不列颠哥伦比亚省(波利山)发生的尾矿坝坍塌和相关的环境灾难只是最广为人知的两起事件：巴西的尾矿坝坍塌造成了超过70亿美元的损失，波利山的尾矿流入了奎斯奈尔湖，这是世界上最大的原始淡水湖之一，也是不列颠哥伦比亚省鲑鱼渔业水道的重要组成部分。尽管之前采取了几项改善尾矿库安全和尾矿库管理的举措，但这些失败仍在继续发生。

The failure of tailings dams with catastrophic results continues to occur with regularity. The recent tailings dam failures and associated environmental disasters in Brazil in 2015 and in British Columbia (Mount Polley) in 2014 are only two of the most well-publisced occurrences: the failure in Brazil resulted in excess of $7 billion dollars in damages, with the tailings from Mount Polley flowed into Quesnel lake, one the largest pristine freshwater bodies in the world, and an important component of the water way for British Colombia's salmon fishery. These failures continue to occur despite several previous initiatives to improve tailings dam safety and tailings impoundment management.