Gauteng's coming water problems

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Chicken Boo

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Has this been discussed here?

http://www.fse.org.za/index.php?opt...soned-well&catid=24:press-clippings&Itemid=54

...the globe’s biggest gold deposits are running out. More and more mines are closing down, and many gold mining companies on the Rand are now waking up to a terrible hangover and a churning stomach after a hard century-or-so on the town. In addition to the pain of tens of thousands of job losses, there’s massive trouble brewing down in the guts of Gauteng; huge volumes of highly poisonous (in many cases also radioactive) water, known as Acid Mine Drainage or AMD, is forming in abandoned underground mine workings. This AMD is steadily rising towards the surface and threatening to poison water sources not only across the province, but, because so many river systems flow out of Gauteng, the rest of the country, too...
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Good times ahead.
 
Is there is another website that has the same article?

Surely this would make front page? Have not seen anything about it.
 
But, as usual, things might not be so simple. WUC’s treatment technology does not, by their own admission, remove 100% of the impurities from AMD 100% of the time. The public, who will be obliged to drink WUC-purified AMD-contaminated water, has not been presented with alternatives. Should WUC’s plan go ahead, the mines will not be paying to clean up the pollution they have caused – water buyers will; and is that legal?
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Seems Joe Public will get screwed yet again....

The central basin’s AMD level is also rising rapidly, and is forecast to hit environmental critical level (the base of the dolomitic layer) in October 2011 if nothing is done – this means that construction of an underground pump station must commence by the end of this year.
Joburg’s water future will be decided in the next few months.
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:eek: :eek:

This is some hectic sh|t!
 
Chicken Boo said:
Has this been discussed here?

Good times ahead.
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It could have been discussed here when we talked about Dr. Antony Turton who was fired from the CSIR.

Unfortunately post mine closure environmental and social impacts have been grossly under estimated during old days of gold mine planning/design. This threat is common to many countries especially where mining started prior promulgation of environmental legislation.

Its not like nothing is being done. However articles like the one you mention are good to put pressure and create public awareness on the issue.

Underground mining is not the only source of this problem, other sources are tailings dams, waste rock dumps which constitute surface sources of acid mine drainage.

But its not all gloom because the problem can be addressed through primary management processes which include decant risk analysis and hazard identification, water pumping and treatment
 
Pfft this has been going on for decades. It explains Vaalie syndrome. For once the saying "there must be something in the water" rings true
 
dlk001 said:
How is acid mine drainage related to ANC administration?
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The BEE fat cats, and other shareholders, get to bail from the mines with all their money, and leave behind these problems for the SA taxpayer to fix. It's just another way of raping South African's.///

Typical of the ANC. Other examples: SABC, Eskom, Telkom, SAA, etc..
 
Carte Blanche ran a related story some time back. They were talking about contaminated water from mines on the west rand leeching up and affecting crops and drinking water in the area. Not good.
 
Morgoth said:
how long ago did the mines know about this?.... who is administrating Rand water, my guess is that the administration waited for everything to fall apart before they acted...
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Its not in the best interest of mines to come clean about is it?

Environmental laws with respect to mining are tighter than they have ever been due to government and NGO discovering the consequences.

In your knowledge, what steps has DWARF and DME taken to address the problem? If you dont know, maybe you should read on it. Go to SAIMM and check many journals and papers that could help you gain an understanding.
 
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Flanders said:
Carte Blanche ran a related story some time back. They were talking about contaminated water from mines on the west rand leeching up and affecting crops and drinking water in the area. Not good.
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Worrying indeed.

Our environmental division keeps growing because today, the mining laws are more stringent than ever. However, mine closures before 1956 were not subject to today's legislative closure requirements and are now the responsibility of the state.

One of the things government is doing is facilitating a system of tradable pollution so to speak whereby operating mines can offset their pollution loads by participating in the rehabilitation of abandoned mines without assuming liability for those sites. There's no easy solution but mines have the best capabilities to address the problem because they are the polluters anyway.

There's many other methods that are being tested in the Witbank area but its not going to be a short solution. The first step is to minimize the problem for escalating. Second step, the longer step, is to solve the problem of abandoned old mines.
 
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dlk001 said:
or 100 years earlier :D
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ok. that does it. Apartheid is the ANC's fault for slacking. Because of apartheid we had sanctions which resulted in the infrastructure decaying with no proper maintenance. Now we have the mother of all farts about to pop below Joburg. Hope the city can hold it in until after the world cup.
 
zippy said:
Hope the city can hold it in until after the world cup.
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why after? I think it'd be great if it happened before so the international community can maybe apply some pressure to our fatcat government to be more pro-active in such matters. But I think the international community also needs to see what a mess this country is in, why do we want to just pretend everything's fine and present a facade? It's already clear the FIFA circus will be on show at a loss for the SA govt (er taxpayers)...
 
zippy said:
ok. that does it. Apartheid is the ANC's fault for slacking. Because of apartheid we had sanctions which resulted in the infrastructure decaying with no proper maintenance. Now we have the mother of all farts about to pop below Joburg. Hope the city can hold it in until after the world cup.
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I suspect AMD has little to do with Apartheid or the ANC. MyBB threads always converge to ANC/Apartheid even when topic is unrelated.

There's a lot to be discussed on the issue if one focuses on our rich history of mining and the negative environmental consequences. Unfortunately the positives of mining come with negatives such as fatalities and messing up the environment.
 
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dlk001 said:
I suspect AMD has little to do with Apartheid or the ANC. MyBB threads always converge to ANC/Apartheid even when topic is unrelated.

There's a lot to be discussed on the issue if one focuses on our rich history of mining and the negative environmental consequences. Unfortunately the positives of mining come with negatives such as fatalities and messing up the environment.
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Very well said. This is an environmental issue which has roots dating 100+ years back. The ANC is not and was not the cause, but I suppose it's so much easier to say Viva ANC, Viva! :rolleyes:
 
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