EA3005:03
Minesite Rehabilitation
| Cairns | HECS Band 2 |
24 hours lectures, 26 hours practicals, 16 hours field excursion. April block mode.
Staff: Dr B Lottermoser
Mining in Australia and its environmental challenges. Environmental degradation caused by historic mining activities and byregulated and unregulated mining practices. Environmental impacts on soils, sediments, water and air. Acid mine drainage. Minesite drainage and its evaluation, modelling, control and remediation. Mineralogy and geochemistry of waste rock dumps and the management of waste rock dumps using solid and wet covers. Tailings disposal and tailings dam failues. Cyanide and gold mining. Open pit hydrology and hydrogeochemistry. Radioactivity and environmental pollution at uranium mines. Environmental management in the industrial minerals industry. Contaminated land assessment.
Learning Objectives:
- to understand the diversity of mining operations and the site specific problems of pollution and rehabilitation associated with them;
- to understand the applicability of geochemistry and mineralogy in delineating and understanding minesite pollution problems;
- to introduce students to simple management strategies of mine waters and mine waste materials;
- to provide a general background on current rehabilitation measures of disturbed or contaminated minesite environments.
Assessment by a two-hour written examination (50%); fieldwork, assignments, tests, seminars and practical classes (50%).