The Environment

     Our team has members from the United States and Bulgaria.  We all studied mining and its effects on the environment.  Mining is responsible for a lot of everyday things that make our lives better.  It is also responsible for the destruction of many areas around the world.
     At first we thought that the United States was the only country that had this problem.  This is not true.  Our team member from Bulgaria told us that his country also suffers from the results of mining.

Lake contaminated by a copper mine
Lake contaminated by copper mine
© Photographer: Jose Fuente | Agency: Dreamstime.com

Kris in Bulgaria:
     Mining is a traditional means of living for our country.  Mining gives jobs to the local people.  Many of these people are jobless and their household incomes are very low.  They can hardly make ends meet and don't have money to buy cool things like computers, nice furniture, etc.  When mines operate, people have well-paid jobs.  Not only that, but mining provides materials for industry which means jobs for other people, products for Bulgaria, and exports for the country.
     However, mining is a threat to nature.  An example of this is Rhodope Mountain.  There are ancient forests there.  When copper was found there, it was good for the economy but it also threatened the birds that nest on the rocks or underground.  Rhodope Mountain has a lot of bird, animal, and plant species.  There are 167 bird species there. Examples are the white-headed hawk and the black stork that are both endangered species in Bulgaria and Europe. 
     In addition to threatening wildlife, mining changes the land.  Mining causes landslides, and pollutes water and soil.  A large amount of wastes are caused by mining.  Sometimes these wastes can be recycled but, in Bulgaria, we lack the technology to make this happen.
    

     Everything on Earth is connected.  Soil, water, air, plants, animals, and man are parts of a whole. When man damages the land with mining, he needs to reclaim the land, or return it to the way it once was.  This is known as reclamation.
     So, when Bulgarians discuss new projects that mean using cyanide [a deadly poison] to mine for gold, you have to wonder if the 300 new jobs are worth it.  I think that a clean environment is more important than money.  When we looked through the Internet for other viewpoints, there were lots about how the land is reclaimed, making the land even better than it was before.  That is not always the case.  I visited an abandoned quarry where nothing was done to reclaim the land.  A whole lot of places don't do anything to help the land when the mining is done. We should mine only for what we need, and do our best to reclaim the land when the mining is done.

Charlie in the United States:

    We agree with Kris, although we think that there should be a whole lot less mining in the world. There are lots of substitutes and man-made minerals now.  Wherever there is a substitute for a real mineral, we should use it.  I don't think mining should be stopped altogether because there are just too many rocks, minerals, and gemstones that don't have synthetic [man-made] substitutes.  Stopping all mining would cause too many people to lose their jobs, too.
     We shouldn't accept that mining will pollute, change, and destroy streams and land.  We should figure out better ways to stop it.  Instead of spending money just to fill up old mines, we need to spend more money for geologists and scientists to find ways to bring back the land even better than we are doing now.  We have one Earth, and as Kris said, all living things are connected.  We can't sit back and think that a little pollution here or a small amount there is okay.  We need to support land reclamation and keep trying to find new and better ways to get the job done.