Overburden | EPFL Graph Search

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In mining, overburden (also called waste or spoil) is the material that lies above an area that lends itself to economical exploitation, such as the rock, soil, and ecosystem that lies above a coal seam or ore body. Overburden is distinct from tailings, the material that remains after economically valuable components have been extracted from the generally finely milled ore. Overburden is removed during surface mining, but is typically not contaminated with toxic components. Overburden may also be used to restore an exhausted mining site during reclamation. Interburden is material that lies between two areas of economic interest, such as the material separating coal seams within strata. Overburden is also used for all soil and ancillary material above the bedrock horizon in a given area. By analogy, overburden is also used to describe the soil and other material that lies above a specific geologic feature, such as a buried astrobleme, or above an unexcavated site of archeological interest. In particle physics, the overburden of an underground laboratory may be important to shield the facility from cosmic radiation that can interfere with experiments. In arboriculture, the word is also used for the soil over the top of the roots of a tree collected from the wild.

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Surface mining

Surface mining, including strip mining, open-pit mining and mountaintop removal mining, is a broad category of mining in which soil and rock overlying the mineral deposit (the overburden) are removed, in contrast to underground mining, in which the overlying rock is left in place, and the mineral is removed through shafts or tunnels. In North America, where the majority of surface coal mining occurs, this method began to be used in the mid-16th century and is practiced throughout the world in the mining of many different minerals.

Mine reclamation

Mine reclamation is the process of modifying land that has been mined to ecologically functional or economically usable state. Although the process of mine reclamation occurs once mining is completed, the planning of mine reclamation activities occurs prior to a mine being permitted or started. Mine reclamation creates useful landscapes that meet a variety of goals ranging from the restoration of productive ecosystems to the creation of industrial and municipal resources.

Tailings

In mining, tailings or tails are the materials left over after the process of separating the valuable fraction from the uneconomic fraction (gangue) of an ore. Tailings are different from overburden, which is the waste rock or other material that overlies an ore or mineral body and is displaced during mining without being processed. The extraction of minerals from ore can be done two ways: placer mining, which uses water and gravity to concentrate the valuable minerals, or hard rock mining, which pulverizes the rock containing the ore and then relies on chemical reactions to concentrate the sought-after material.