Effective environmental performance following mine closure: an example from the Brukunga Mine Remediation Project South Australia

摘要

The legacy Brukunga mine site in a community in the Adelaide Hills, South Australia, currently generates acid and metalliferous drainage (AMD) from pyritic waste rock dumps and tailings that requires surface water diversion and ongoing interception, pumping and treatment of that water, with disposal of the produced sludge. The waste rock dumps and tailings storage facility have the potential to generate AMD for several hundred years, without improvement in the environmental condition. The government of South Australia has, over the last several years, supported the development of a remedial solution that is in essence maintenance free and, therefore, "walk away". Strategy development has been followed by the preliminary and now detailed design on the first stage of the remedial solution. The involvement of specialists from diverse technical areas has led to a design that considers and has, at times, been driven by geochemistry, engineering, geology, geomorphology, hydrology and hydrogeology. This paper discusses the remedial objectives and process by which the detailed design of the first stage of the remedial solution has been developed at Brukunga, a process that could be used as an example for the management of other similarly challenging mine-affected areas.