Remediation of Historical Mine Sites-Technical Summaries and Bibliography

In the early history of mining, environmental impacts were not understood and not really a matter of concern. As a result, many companies have inherited a legacy of mining-related environmental problems, especially those dealing with hard-rock mining sites. Compounding these difficulties is the fact that conventional removal and "pump and treat" technologies are expensive. There are alternatives, however. This book, co-published with the American Geological Institute, introduces the known range of methods that may represent alternatives to traditional technologies. It identifies both existing and developing environmental remediation methods that apply to historical hard-rock mining sites. Each section in the book provides short technical summaries of methods considered promising and potentially suitable for further evaluation and testing. Each summary includes a description of the method and how it might be applied to remediation; issues involved, including advantages and disadvantages of each method and comments on any unresolved issues pertaining to practicality and economic viability; and discussion on how advanced or well implemented the method is for remediating hard-rock mining sites. The book is fully indexed and contains a thorough bibliography of related sources and databases.