NEWS

posted May 18, 2021 at 06:00 pm by Manila Standard

Achieving sustainability in the minerals industry and charting a greener community, researchers from the UK and the Philippines bagged research grants to facilitate and develop innovative solutions that can promote responsible mining and maximize value-adding from minerals.

In photo are NERC International Associate Director Dr. Sarah Webb and PCIEERD Executive Director Dr. Enrico C. Paringit, together with various researchers and industry key stakeholders, during the UK-Philippines Minerals and Mining Scoping Meeting held on March 3 to 5, 2020 at Hotel Astoria, Puerto Princesa, Palawan. Image source: Manila Standard.

Of the 18 proposals received online, these five research projects stood out during the selection process conducted by the Department of Science and Technology – Philippine Council for Industry, Energy, and Emerging Technology Research and Development (DOST-PCIEERD) and UK Research & Innovation – Natural Environment Research Council (UKRI-NERC). They are the following:

1. SusNi or Developing a Sustainable pathway for the Philippine Nickel sector – Spearheaded by Paul Lusty of British Geological Survey-UK and Prof. Romell Seronay from Caraga State University-Philippines, the project aims to assess the impacts of mining, explore novel techniques for mineral exploration, metal extraction and recovery, and environmental monitoring, all considered within the socio-economic context of the Caraga Region, using an approach based on Strategic Environmental and Social Assessment (SESA).
2. PROMT or Philippines Remediation of Mine Tailings – this project initiated by Prof. Gawen Jenkin from the University of Leicester-UK and Prof. Carlo Arcilla of the Philippine Nuclear Research Institute-Philippines will build an innovative research program to test sustainable tailings management, remediation and rehabilitation. It aims to produce tailings with less water consumption and greater stability and show how they can be monitored and adaptively managed in real time. Also, it will enable the processing of modern and legacy tailings to recover more metals, while decontaminating them, encouraging rehabilitation and long-term stabilization and reuse of the associated ecosystem services.
3. The Philippine Mining at the National to Catchment Scale: from Legacy Impacts to Sustainable Futures – headed by Dr. Richard Williams from the University of Glasgow-UK and Dr. Decibel Faustino-Eslava from the University of the Philippines-Los Baños, Philippines, the project aims to develop a proposal to realize a combined geomorphological and biogeochemical based management approach to remediate waste and protect the environment, at national- to catchment-scales. This will enable catchment management practitioners to remediate legacy metal mining impacts and protect ecosystems as well as humans from the potentially negative effects of metal mine contaminants arising from current and future mining activities.
4. Systems Approach for Greener, Eco-efficient and Sustainable mineral resource management or SAGES – Led by Dr Pablo Rafael Brito Parada of Imperial College London-UK and Dr. Arnel Beltran of the De La Salle University-Philippines, the project brings together the multi-disciplinary expertise of industry leaders, scientists, technology experts, community leaders and policy makers to develop a research programme for greener, eco-efficient, and sustainable mineral resource management in the Philippines.

SAGES will develop a circular economy mining framework using a systems approach to address three mine waste categories: tailings and silts, mine drainage, and polluted soils. Transforming legacy mines into future mines and mine wastes into secondary resources can simultaneously reduce waste generation, provide additional economic benefits to stakeholders, empower host communities and improve rehabilitation programmes. This project will supply the paradigm shift necessary to stimulate growth of the resource extraction sector in the Philippines.

Source: Manila Standard