Abstract
Mining inevitably violates the natural environment. The consequences of its functioning for the environment are diverse at different stages of the life of the enterprise. During mineral exploration, environmental damage is generally negligible, localized, and can be relatively easily repaired. Subsequent initial work, both with open pit and underground mining methods, has a more significant impact on the environment, but still less significant than with the development itself. During extraction and enrichment, the main production process, the most noticeable consequences are violation of land resources, pollution by wastewater, changes in hydraulic regime and composition of atmospheric air. The key factor, of course, is not how much land is used for any particular activity, but whether this use can be compatible with maintaining environmental integrity.
Highlights
Despite the fact that about 30 years ago the concept of sustainable development was officially approved, the current economic activity of humankind obviously contributes to environmental degradation and the planet's resources
Without a clear understanding of the effects, greening the activities of industrial enterprises will remain for a long time a slogan that has little practical value for owners of enterprises investing in their own profit, rather than meeting the common millennium development goals, recently formulated by the UN and presented as global trends in the development of humankind
Mining and mineral processing create several types of solid waste: overburden rocks moving to gain access to a mineral deposit; waste rock separated from ore during mining; and waste formed during the enrichment process
Summary
Despite the fact that about 30 years ago the concept of sustainable development was officially approved, the current economic activity of humankind obviously contributes to environmental degradation and the planet's resources. Environmental friendliness of society is so attractive that it has become a unifying topic of both scientific research and political decisions, but at the same time, populist speculative discussions about environmental policy and technological innovations. Even despite a noticeable level of geoecological and ecosystem researches, noting the environmental impact of the mining industry. Without a clear understanding of the effects, greening the activities of industrial enterprises will remain for a long time a slogan that has little practical value for owners of enterprises investing in their own profit, rather than meeting the common millennium development goals, recently formulated by the UN and presented as global trends in the development of humankind
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