Mining is a lucrative industry that has managed to erode away most of Earth?s natural resources and has led to massive craters on areas that were once home for several species.  Across planet Earth, we have mining taking place incessantly and is it too scary to look into the statistics.  Mining is a 1 triilion industry with the lobby threatening to destroy the rain forests and forest lands at a high rate.  In India, mining industry is focused on iron ore, coal, bauxite and lime stone.  Some of the effects on ecology due to mining are discussed next.

a.      Polluting the Air -  Most of the surface mining operations produce excessive dust from blasting operations and haul roads.  Though there are guidelines to control the spread of dust to the environment, these have proved to be ineffective in practice.  Therefore, release of heavy metals to the air including lead and other chemicals such as sulphur dioxide are some examples of air pollution caused due to mining operations.  Typically, the fine dust from mining operations get deposited in the trees and over time these trees suddenly become dry and thereafter with no growth observable, these trees perish.   

b.     Polluting the water -  This category of pollution is perhaps the most destructive when it comes to ecological imbalance.   The mining as a process requires large quantities of water.   The water for the mining process is drawn from nearby sources including rivers and bore wells and mixed with chemicals that would assist the mining process.  The output from the mining process contains sulphide minerals that react with air and water to form sulphuric acid.  On a large scale, the ground water is polluted with these chemicals and the water turns acidic which harms all living beings.  On a larger scale, the land also becomes uncultivable thereby hampering the agricultural production. 

c.     Polluting the land – The mining lands are left to the nature to fill up as the mining companies abandon these sites at will.  For example, for copper mining, these lands are torn apart for extracting ores that contain less than 1% copper.  Furthermore, once mining operations cease, there is no ecology build up in the nearby lands as the noise and the pollutions drive away any growth of plants, trees or cultivation.

d.     Health and safety:  Mining as an industry is extremely risky not only for the environment but also for the miners themselves.  With long hours of exposure to environments with less oxygen and sunlight, the miners are exposed to various diseases including breathing difficulties and skin allergies.   In addition, mining operations pose additional threats of rock-falls. 

With these above points, it appears that the poorer countries are generally awarded high share of resource seeking investment from companies.  These not only lead to environmental issues but also other instabilities in the regions.  The continued battering of our environment will only lead to further loss of habitat triggering more socio-economic problems that are difficult to solve.  Reduction, recycle and reuse are the only options whereas as technology speeds up to the next phase of mining in space, perhaps that would bring relief to our ecosystem here on Earth.

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