Fujian Longyan: Multinational mining companies build "green competitiveness"
2024-08-12
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Xinhua News Agency reporter Qin Hong
Walking through the Zijinshan gold and copper mine in Longyan World Geopark in Fujian Province is like walking into a forest park. Although the bottom of the hundreds of meters deep mine is still in production, there is no trace of the "dirty, messy and poor" traditional mining environment in the mine area, and the slopes near the pit mouth are already lush with grass.
"Zijinshan Gold and Copper Mine is a model of 'green mine' created by Zijin Mining Group." Xu Huibiao, safety and environmental protection director of Zijinshan Gold and Copper Mine, said that the mine produces thousands of tons of waste slag every year. In the past, the mining area would form a large area of waste land, and the mine wastewater and other factors put the mine ecological environment under great pressure. To this end, the group continues to carry out research on waste slag land and slope management and ecological restoration technology.
A mine park built by Zijinshan Gold and Copper Mine on the abandoned tailings land. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Qin Hong
After continuous exploration, Zijin Mining Group has solved the problems of high-sulfur slag pollution and mine wastewater treatment, and summarized the ecological restoration and protection experience of "layered water control, slope shortening, soil improvement, and plant selection". By the end of 2023, Zijinshan Gold and Copper Mine has implemented greening operations on a total area of more than 20,000 mu and planted more than 4.2 million flowers and trees.
"Based on the regional characteristics of different altitudes in the mining area, Zijin Mining Group has innovated a mine vegetation restoration model that uses forests where forests are suitable, uses grass where grass is suitable, and uses tiered greening." Lin Jinglan, deputy director of the Soil and Water Conservation Experimental Station of the Fujian Provincial Water Resources Department, said the "production, construction and governance at the same time" model minimizes the impact of mining operations on the ecological environment.
In 2009, Zijinshan National Mining Park became one of the first national mining parks; in 2021, the Zijinshan Gold and Copper Mine Joint Development Project was awarded the title of "National Soil and Water Conservation Demonstration Project"; last year, the "Zijinshan Green Mine Construction Case" was included in the UNESCO World Geopark publications. Today, the mining area's tourist line consisting of the Geological and Mineral Museum, Open-Pit Mining Industrial Park, Botanical Garden, Yacht Wharf, Rose Garden, etc. has become a popular mining park study and tourism spot.
Zijinshan Gold and Copper Mine is conducting pit slope management while in production. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Qin Hong
The reporter learned that Zijin Mining Group has mining investment projects in 17 provinces (regions) in China and 15 countries overseas. Its green mine construction experience is constantly being replicated and expanded, and has become an important part of its competitiveness.
Xu Huibiao introduced that Zijin Mining Group's Deerni Copper Mine is located in the high-altitude and cold regions of Qinghai, and the ecological restoration project after mine closure faces great challenges. By the end of 2023, through continuous research, the group has made the ecological restoration area of the mine reach nearly 200 hectares, becoming a model project for mine closure and ecological restoration in high-altitude areas. Its "Artificial Vegetation Restoration Project in High-altitude Mine" won the Green Mining Science and Technology Major Project Award.
"The group's Musonoyi mining area in the Democratic Republic of the Congo has pioneered the development of local ecological mining." Zheng Youcheng, secretary of the board of directors of Zijin Mining Group, said that the survival rate of slope restoration vegetation in the mining area was less than 10% at the beginning. The group explored ways such as laying humus soil to improve soil quality and artificial deep planting, so that the mining area has achieved a green planting area of 400,000 square meters, and the greening area coverage rate exceeds 90%.
In response to global climate change, Zijin Mining Group has strictly controlled carbon emissions throughout the mine life cycle in recent years, continuously increased the layout of clean energy projects in mines, and promoted the process of electrification substitution. Its photovoltaic power generation, hydropower, wind power, hydrogen (ammonia) energy and other multi-energy complementary solutions have been gradually implemented in the demonstration mining area.
"The construction experience of mine 'green electricity projects' and other projects will also be promoted in an orderly manner to the company's global mining areas." Zheng Youcheng said that in recent years, these explorations have also enabled the group to maintain industry leadership in some of the global mainstream ESG environmental ratings, and have boosted its domestic and foreign mining project mergers and acquisitions and other business expansion.
