Environmental recovery in sterile waste pile in limestone mining

• Autor(a) principal: Santos, Evandro Gomes dos
• Data de Publicação: 2015
• Outros Autores: Oliveira Neto, Raul, Abichequer, Luciana Arnt, Souza, Luis Eduardo de, Marques, Renato, Gonçalves, Ítalo Gomes
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Revista Monografias Ambientais
• Texto Completo: http://periodicos.ufsm.br/remoa/article/view/18713
• topic: Environmental recovery; Sterile; Mining; Limestone; Recuperação ambiental; Estéril; Mineração; Calcário

Overburden material and waste are the main residues generated by mining, with attention regard to its proper handling and disposal. Although the limestone extraction that comprise basic unit operations over the years moving large volumes of sterile, which is deposited in piles. In this context the present study aims to evaluate and propose improvements to the constructive aspects of the piles under study, identifying the environmental impacts and proposing mitigation and compensation measures, as appropriate. To obtain the data was carried out topographic survey and processing the same, first in the Excel worksheet, and later they were used in the Surfer and Autocad software. In the environmental impact assessment was used to Leopold matrix and ISO 14001 parameters, defining prioritization criteria of the significances impacts. The study of geometric survey indicated problems on the conformation of slopes and berms, although factors such as maximum height and the conservation of permanent preservation areas are in agreement. As for stability, the safety factors values are, on average, according to the law that determining a minimum of 1.5, however, some intermediate slopes do not reach this value. There are also areas that do not attending the proposed good practices such as slope angle of less than 36, but in the whole pile are not observed signs of rupture. The environmental impact assessment carried out revealed that 50% of impacts are severe and 50% are medium, which were proposed mitigation and compensation measures and action plans and monitoring. In conclusion it can be said that the pile attending only in part the standards and best practices, which is essential in the implementation of the measures and the action plan proposed.