Sustainable Development

Today, the mining industry globally seeks to fulfill its commitments to sustainable development principles by reducing mining, extraction, and mineral processing operations. The best opportunity to reduce the impact of mining operations, compared to during or after operations, is the mine design stage. Reducing the impact of mining operations alone will not be sufficient to advance the industry towards sustainability; opportunities to reduce the impact along and between the production and recycling chains must be considered. Furthermore, the construction of higher-efficiency factories, due to the feedback effects related to the importance of a metal’s use and its connection to consumption in the industry and service provision in a community, does not, in itself, lead to sustainable development.