Mineral waste in the UK : innovation, optimisation and recycling

Mineral waste is largely an unavoidable by-product of the extraction, processing and production of mineral-based products. The UK is well-endowed with mineral resources which have been worked for thousands of years resulting in millions of tonnes of mineral waste across the country. The most significant mineral resource worked was coal with more than 26,000 million tonnes of coal produced and 3600 million tonnes of waste rock. Other significant volumes of mineral waste were derived from metal mining including tin, copper, lead and iron ore. Also a considerable volume was derived from the production of industrial and construction minerals such as brick clay, building stone, china clay, salt and slate. Currently the largest volumes of mineral waste produced in the UK are those associated with the production of construction aggregate from hard rock quarries and sand and gravel operations. The amount of mineral waste produced in the UK is currently not known in detail. Any figures for mineral waste are usually based on calculations that rely on the amount of saleable products recorded in the Annual Minerals Raised inquiry. Legislation in the UK is primarily concerned with the safe disposal of waste. It was not until the introduction of the Landfill Tax in 1996 and the Aggregates Levy in 2002 that concerted effort was made by the UK minerals industry to reduce, reuse or recycle mineral waste. A significant amount of research has been carried out since then to identify new uses for mineral waste, much of it funded in the 1990s and 2000s by the taxes raised. This presentation will give a summary of the research carried out in the UK on mineral waste. It will focus on efforts to reduce the amount of waste produced, enable the reuse of mineral-based products and find uses for mineral waste.