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Clean Up Hard Rock Mines
The United States has over 557,000 abandoned mines which have never been returned to the state of their local environment prior to the mining. Vital waterways are polluted by these abandoned mines, many of which were built for extracting hardrock minerals like gold, silver, copper, uranium and lead. Some of these sites now pose serious threats to the health and safety of communities downstream.
At least 40 percent of stream reaches in the headwaters of western watersheds are contaminated by mine waste, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Total clean-up estimates range from $32 billion to $72 billion, but little progress has been made because the operators of these mines are no longer in business -- and there is no program dedicated to funding the cleanup of abandoned hardrock mines.
For more information, please contact:
Techa Beaumont
Executive Director
Workphone: +61 2 9557 9019
Mobile: +61 (0) 409 318 406
Created: 13 Oct 2004 | Last updated: 13 Oct 2004
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