Abstract
Windblown dust from tailings storage facilities (TSFs), particularly in towns with liquidated mining companies, exacerbate air pollution. Companies of suddenly closed mine operations evade the responsibility of environmental and socio-economic care required by law. It is common for suddenly closed mines to have poorly rehabilitated TSFs which become a significant source of pollution by dust for the surrounding communities. There is strong evidence that acute exposure to high levels of air pollutants causes significant mortality and morbidity. However, very few studies have estimated the externalities of PM10 emanating from gold TSFs especially when a mine closes suddenly owing to company liquidation. By exploring the externalities of PM10 arising from wind erosion of suspended particulate matter from TSFs, this study fills an existing gap in the literature. A ‘bottom-up’ approach was implemented in this study following the External Energy (ExternE) project, and a gold mine operation that was liquidated between 2013 and 2017, was used as the case study. In this study, the externality of PM10 estimated was the cost of illness focusing specifically on respiratory-related illnesses. The results showed that the estimated cost of illness associated with PM10 inhalation was a total of R 5,560,022 including assessments of both neighboring Wedela and the Gold mine village based on the threshold concentration set by the South African National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) guideline and R 66,092,760 when considering the Fund for Research into Industrial Development Growth Equity (FRIDGE), Airshed and Infotox. Thus, it was concluded that air pollution by windblown dust from partially rehabilitated TSFs has the potential to significantly affect surrounding mining communities’ socio-economic status through poor health and the costs thereof.
Highlights
Gold mining in South Africa established other mining sectors in the country
This paper aims to assess the external cost of dust emanating from gold tailings storage facilities (TSFs) during the liquidation period of a mining company, where no rehabilitation of TSFs was undertaken
This study focuses on the external costs of the wind-blown dust from various partially rehabilitated tailings storage facilities in and around a gold mine village
Summary
Gold mining in South Africa established other mining sectors in the country. Since 1886, gold mining has contributed significantly to employment and the general economic development of the country [1]. A key to the mining sector in the country, has caused harm to a wide range of receptors such as negatively impacting surrounding communities, affecting natural ecosystems, and damaging building materials. Market prices do not reflect externalities, so there is a difference between the social and private cost of producing gold For this reason, internalizing externalities into private costs is necessary to “get the price right” and to create market-based incentives for environmentally friendly gold production. When dealing with challenges pertaining to mine closure effects, the literature has been biased toward investigating environmental aspects with a lack of consideration for socio-economic aspects, such as estimating the external costs mining impacts to society. The study of externalities is important to assist in filling the gap of quantifying the socio-economic impacts through estimating external costs of environmental degradation to surrounding communities
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