Quantifying the potential seepage from the Quillayes porphyry Cu tailing dam using stable isotopes (Chile)
- Autores: Dídac Navarro Ciurana, Albert Soler i Gil, Agnés Saleta Daví, Neus Otero Pérez, Carlos A. Quintana, Diego San Miguel Cornejo, Mónica Musalem, Guillibert Novoa Godoy, Cristóbal Carrasco Jaramillo, Evelin Aguirre Dueñas, Manuel Alexis Escudero Vargas
- Localización: Macla: revista de la Sociedad Española de Mineralogía, ISSN 1885-7264, Nº. 24, 2019
- Idioma: inglés
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Resumen
Chile is extraordinarily enriched in porphyry-style copper deposits and is the largest Cu producer worldwide.
Mining activities of these ores, which are characterized by low Cu grades and high tonnages, produce several environmental footprints, as large amounts of tailing production and disposal in dams, and seepage of tailing dam waters towards the neighboring aquifers. The tailing dam managements usually includes different strategies to minimize seepage towards groundwater, such as drainage ditches and pumping wells installed as hydraulic barriers.
Nevertheless, these strategies are not always sufficient to avoid seepage waters, and there is a growing interest to develop tools to trace and quantify the impact of tailings in groundwater. Mine tailings are characterized by high contents of dissolved sulfate, and isotopic studies have been used to trace the sources and processes of SO4 2- in tailing waters (e.g., Dold and Spangenberg, 2005;
Spangenberg et al., 2007), due to their potential environmental impact. However, less studies are focused to the use of isotope geochemistry as a monitoring tool to determine the tailings seepage towards the aquifers.
In the present study, isotope data (!2H- !18O-H2O and !34S-!18O-SO4 2-) from the hydric systems related to the Quillayes tailing dam (from the Pelambres porphyry Cu deposit, Chile) have been studied to illustrate their potential as tool for quantifying tailings seepage contribution to groundwater.
