I watched an interesting webinar in May on navigating the challenges and opportunities that come with mine closure. In it, EY’s Global Mining and Metals Leader, Paul Mitchell, spoke to Bjorn Weeks, Senior Advisor of Closure for Teck, and Allison Brown, Group Director of Reclamation and Closure for Barrick Gold, about their experiences of closure (both good and bad), and how companies can move towards integrated closure strategies.
Closure and legacy site management is part of the mine lifecycle that few people talk about, yet globally, the mining sector is set to spend over US$50 billion on these processes and assets over the coming decades. Traditional closure approaches, which see most companies wait until the end of economic extraction before environmental rehabilitation and restoration begins, can carry high potential for budget overruns and pose substantial social risks.
Social license, in which closure plays an important part, was flagged as one of the mining industry’s top five risks and opportunities for 2025 in the latest edition of EY’s annual sectoral survey.
“Mine closure is extremely complex, impacting a wide range of stakeholders with different, and increasingly high, expectations,” wrote the authors. “A poor closure creates a negative legacy that is extremely difficult and costly to remediate. Despite the dangers of getting it wrong, only 5% of our respondents see it as a key risk or opportunity.”
What was more concerning, and I suspect, was the premise for the aforementioned webinar, was that the survey also revealed that only 35% of legacy assets and 50% of operating assets globally have closure strategies. I’ll say that again: only half of the world’s operational mines currently have closure strategies in place.
According to EY, data cited in the report was based on responses from 353 organisations with revenues of US$1 billion or more and submitted by senior leadership. These are not mom and pop businesses – they are tier one and mid-tier operators that should be applying the highest operating standards and practices at all of their mines regardless of when they were permitted.
How this situation came to play is a question that shareholders and board members should be raising with leaders of the relevant companies ASAP. But, more importantly, given that half the world’s largest operational mines don’t have closure plans, and that social licensing is a major risk for an industry that’s under huge pressure to bring new resources online, what the heck are we going to do about it?
As EY suggests: “Miners need to consider the legacy they want to leave behind by planning mines with closure in mind… Designing and operating mining assets with closure in mind ensures decisions drive long-term value.”
I’ll leave you to ponder that as we head into a month of content based around environmental stewardship on The Intelligent Miner. Make sure you’re subscribed to read upcoming articles in full and send me your own thoughts via email.
Carly