Mining Legacies

Mount Morgan Mine Legacy

admin — Wed, 23 Jan 2013 05:03:32 +0000

The Mount Morgan gold-copper mine generated not only extra-ordinary wealth for its major shareholders but has left Queensland and Australia with probably it’s largest and most polluting mining legacy…

Featuring Michael McCabe from the Capricorn Conservation Council, Rockhampton Queensland & Dr. Gavin Mudd, Environmental Engineer from Monash University in Melbourne; Through footage taken in 2012, this short video gives a recent overview of the environmental legacy left by the Mount Morgan Mine on the Dee River and surrounding areas.

Click here to read more about the Mount Morgan Mining Legacy.

Mount Morgan Mining Legacy from jessie boylan on Vimeo.

Minister Burke on legacy mines

admin — Wed, 19 Dec 2012 10:09:46 +0000

This short video is about legacy mines in Tasmania’s Tarkine. Great to see Minister Burke recognising the problem, hopefully this leads to Australian action on the thousands of legacy mine sites across Australia.

website upgrade

admin — Tue, 18 Dec 2012 05:32:33 +0000

Followers of the site will notice the website upgrade, particularly the map and search based functions.

For those who haven’t seen it before, welcome.

We are still making the changes, soon every page and more will have the details and images linked. Until then — please be patient.

Focus Site: Eva Creek, Northen Territory

admin — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 01:22:34 +0000

Eva is an old uranium mine located 16 km west of the Queensland border in the Northern Territory, it is 50km south of Redbank Copper Mine. The first uranium find at Pandanus Creek was made by R T Norris in 1955, and the following year Eva Clarke, Norris’ niece, soon discovered the main orebody, simply by picking up yellow pebbles which Norris found to be radioactive.

Remnants of Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Jessie Boylan / MPI 2011

Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Jessie Boylan / MPI 2011

Remnants of Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Jessie Boylan / MPI 2011

Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Radioactive materials stored in shipping containers at Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Remnants of Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Radioactive materials stored in shipping containers at Eva, a former uranium mine in the Northern Territory, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Eva; Former Uranium Mine, Northern Territory, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Geiger Counter Readings at Eva - former uranium mine, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

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Eva Uranium Mine

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Geiger Counter Readings at Eva - former uranium mine, © Phoebe Barton / MPI 2011

Wordpress Slideshow

More details on the Eva Creek webpage

Feature Mine: Redbank

admin — Sat, 30 Jun 2012 03:10:52 +0000

Redbank is a copper mine located in the north-east corner of the Northern Territory near the border with Queensland in the Gulf Country. It ceased operations after 3 years mining in August 1996 due to falling copper prices and is now on ‘care and maintenance’.

Follow the link to see more images, videos and info about Redbank.

Feature Mine; Baal Gammon

admin — Thu, 28 Jun 2012 03:17:41 +0000

The Baal Gammon Mine is a long abandoned open cut and underground copper mine located in northern Queensland just off the Herberton to Petford Road, around 1370km northwest of Brisbane. There is significant acid mine drainage leaking out of the former mine tunnel, impacting on the adjacent creek. At the tunnel’s exist, the pH was 2.6 – extremely acidic – while at the discharge into the creek pH was still strongly acidic at 3.6. The site is currently owned by nearby base metals miner Kagara Limited, who operate the Mt Garnet zinc-copper mine just to the south. It is hoped that in the process of a new copper mine that the ongoing environmental legacy from Baal Gammon is remediated.
Click on the link to see more photos from Baal Gammon

Feature Mine; Woodsreef

admin — Tue, 26 Jun 2012 03:19:24 +0000

The former Woodsreef asbestos mine was first mined from 1919, but only on a small scale. From 1970 to 1983 it was mined on a large scale by the Chrysotile Corporation of Australia, apparently producing about 75 million tonnes of waste rock, 25 million tonnes of tailings and leaving a great hole in the landscape.

Click on the link to see images from Woodsreef

Feature Mine; McArthur River

admin — Mon, 25 Jun 2012 03:21:43 +0000

The McArthur River lead-zinc mine is one of the world’s largest zinc mines and deposits, presently producing about 180,000 tonnes of zinc per year.

The deposit was discovered in 1955 but underground mining did not begin until 1995 – due mainly to the very difficult nature of the ore to process. The site was converted to a highly controversial open cut mine in 2006 – which was fiercely opposed by local indigenous people due to the massive diversion of the McArthur River.

The mine is currently owned by Xstrata, acquired during its takeover of Mt Isa Mines in 2003. Xstrata are considering yet another expansion at McArthur River.

Feature Mine; Emuford

admin — Sun, 24 Jun 2012 03:23:43 +0000

Very close to the former mining town of Emuford is an abandoned mine. Emuford is west of Irvinebank, just west of Cairns in northern Queensland.

The waste rock dump was clearly river rock, since the pebbles were very rounded, but the stream was heavily polluted with iron staining – the tell tale signature of acid mine drainage (AMD).

Not only was the mine a mystery, the AMD started upstream of the waste rock dump and its source in the stream could not be located (in the quick time we had). Furthermore, the pH was only 6.5 – close to neutral – suggesting some dilution as water flows in the stream.

The entire site was a good mystery indeed – though the gross pollution is entirely obvious.

Click on the link to see images from Emuford.

Feature Mine; Rum Jungle

admin — Sat, 23 Jun 2012 03:29:47 +0000

The infamous Rum Jungle uranium mine was Australia’s first large scale uranium mine – producing uranium for the American and British nuclear weapons from 1954 to 1971. Initially planned as an underground mine, the difficult ground conditions forced a quick switch to open cut mining – from three mines at White’s, Dysons and Rum Jungle Creek South. The mine also produced a small amount of copper, sourced mainly from the additional Intermediate open cut mine. The project was owned by the Australian Government, through the then Australian Atomic Energy Commission, (AAEC, now ANSTO), but it was operated under contract by former Rio Tinto subsidiary Territory Enterprises Pty Ltd (‘TEP’).

Click on the link to see more info and images from Rum Jungle

Feature Mine; Gidgee

admin — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 03:31:32 +0000

The old Gidgee gold mine operated in the 1990s and was a modest scale. As can be seen from these photo’s, although the 1990s was supposed to have decent environmental regulation and rehabilitation standards, the dust storm from the tailings dam is a major hazard as well as the direct access the cattle have to the former pit. So much for modern industry performance ! Recent exploration has found more gold ore, leading to the prospect of it being re-opened very soon – perhaps they might even get the regulation and performance right this time.

Click on the link to read more about Gidgee and see more photos.

Feature Mine; Poison Water

admin — Wed, 20 Jun 2012 03:33:57 +0000

We heard of this ‘legendary’ polluted creek just west of Irvinebank – even known as “Poison Water”.

The extreme pollution from acid mine drainage (AMD) appears to be associated with the long abandoned Montalbion mine, located nearby on an elevated ridge. Based on visual observations, the pollution appears to be very episodic, related to storm events flushing more pollution into the creek. The pH was a strongly acidic 3.3.

Click on the link to see more images from Poison Water.