Rehabilitating Abandoned Mines could Create Thousands of Badly Needed Jobs, Report Says

Mining & Minerals - Evaluations / Wastes & Environmental Issues

Date posted: 10/23/16

Mark Willacy reports that the rehabilitation of abandoned mines could create thousands of jobs in areas hit hard by the resources downturn, according to a new report. Queensland alone has more than 15,000 abandoned mines, including 300 classified as mega, large or medium size. A report on these mines by the environmental group Lock the Gate Alliance is recommending the introduction of an independent authority to rehabilitate the sites. It proposes funding the remediation with a modest industry levy or from the interest on a new cash bond deposit system. The report said the extra money could help fund a comprehensive mine rehabilitation program in areas where the resources boom has ended. There is several thousand jobs that can be created in rural and regional Queensland, particularly in mining precincts that are badly needed now after the downturn, Lock the Gate Rick Humphries said. So it will be an employment generator and an economic activity generator. But Queensland Mines Minister Anthony Lynham said many old mines still contain valuable resources waiting to be exploited. There are a lot of resources left in old tailing dams, old tailing deposits. I encourage resource companies to come to us with innovative ideas of how they can access those deposits, Dr. Lynham said. Rehabilitation can extinguish a resource. Fellow graziers Ian and Marianna Campbell are also dealing with the legacy of an abandoned mine. They own the 180,000 hectare Rosebud Station, which encompasses the Mary Kathleen uranium mine between Mount Isa and Cloncurry. The mine, which shut in the 1980s, won an award in 1986 from the Institution of Engineers Australia for rehabilitation work. But Mr. Campbell claims that after it rains, contaminated water from the massive pit leaks into the surrounding environment. He claims that everything leaches down the river system and pollutes what used to be a pristine sort of river, the Cameron River.