Mining News

June 13, 2025

Top Headlines

Cotton Virus Circulated Undetected for Nearly 20 Years, Study Finds

May 29, 2025 — A virus responsible for damaging cotton crops across the southern United States has been lurking in U.S. fields for nearly 20 years -- undetected. According to new research, cotton leafroll dwarf virus (CLRDV), long believed to be a recent arrival, ...

EV Battery Recycling Key to Future Lithium Supplies

May 29, 2025 — Lightweight, powerful lithium-ion batteries are crucial for the transition to electric vehicles, and global demand for lithium is set to grow rapidly over the next 25 years. A new analysis looks at how new mining operations and battery recycling ...

Coastal Alaska Wolves Exposed to High Mercury Concentrations from Eating Sea Otters

May 28, 2025 — Scientists show that wolves that are eating sea otters in Alaska have much higher concentrations of mercury than those eating other prey such as deer and ...

Study of Türkiye Gold Mine Landslide Highlights Need for Future Monitoring

May 8, 2025 — A new analysis of a fatal landslide that occurred on 13 February 2024 at the pler Gold Mine in Turkiye reveals that the site of the landslide had been slowly moving for at least four years prior to the ...

What If Mother Earth Could Sue for Mistreatment?

Apr. 21, 2025 — The study highlights the transformative potential of the Rights of Nature, which views nature as a rights-bearing entity, not merely an object of regulation and subjugation by extractive industries. The Llurimagua case -- a dispute over a mining ...

Deep-Sea Mining Risks Leads Study to Urge Shift to Circular Solutions

Apr. 14, 2025 — Deep sea mining operations are expected to increase the negative impact on environmental indicators by up to 13 per cent, a change categorized as having 'great' significance, relative to the 'without' DSM scenario, notably through increased coastal ...

Tree Rings Track Atmospheric Mercury Cheaply

Apr. 9, 2025 — Wild fig tree rings offer a cheap method for tracking toxic atmospheric mercury, a byproduct of gold mining in the Global South, according to a new ...

Electrochemical Method Supports Nitrogen Circular Economy

Apr. 3, 2025 — Imagine a world where industrial waste isn't just reduced, it's turned into something useful. This kind of circular economy is already in the works for carbon. Now, researchers in energy, environmental & chemical engineering at Washington University ...

Rocky Mountain Snow Is Contaminated, Study Shows

Apr. 1, 2025 — Mountain snowpacks accumulate snow throughout the winter, building up stores of water that will supply communities across the American West throughout the long dry season. Now, a new study shows that as storms carry snow to the Rocky Mountains, they ...

Footprints of Deep-Sea Mining

Mar. 5, 2025 — Mining of polymetallic nodules from the seabed might lead to significant and long-lasting ecological changes -- both in the mined area, where surface sediments and the fauna living in and on it are removed along with the nodules, and on the adjacent ...

The Rising Tide of Sand Mining: A Growing Threat to Marine Life

Feb. 21, 2025 — Scientists outline the urgency to better identify the significant damage sand extraction across the world heaps upon marine ...

Biodiversity in England's Rivers Improved as Metal Pollution Reduced

Feb. 19, 2025 — An improvement in freshwater biodiversity in England's rivers was linked to reductions in pollution of zinc and copper, largely due to the decline of coal burning and heavy industry, say researchers. Invertebrates are used as an important measure of ...

Latest Headlines

updated 1:14pm EDT

Engineered Animals Show New Way to Fight Mercury Pollution

Feb. 12, 2025 — Using genes borrowed from bacteria, researchers have demonstrated fish and flies can be engineered to break down methylmercury and remove it from their bodies as a less harmful gas, offering new ways ...

Examining the Potential Environmental Effects of Mining the World's Largest Lithium Deposit

Feb. 10, 2025 — A trove of lithium-rich brine exists underground in Bolivia. Researchers conducted the first comprehensive chemical analysis of wastewater associated ...

Recycling Lithium-Ion Batteries Cuts Emissions and Strengthens Supply Chain

Jan. 31, 2025 — Researchers compared the environmental impacts of lithium-ion battery recycling to mining for new materials and found that recycling significantly outperforms mining in terms of greenhouse gas ...

Lead Contamination in Ancient Greece Points to Societal Change

Jan. 30, 2025 — Studies of sediment cores from the sea floor and the coastal regions surrounding the Aegean Sea show that humans contaminated the environment with lead early on in antiquity. Geoscientists conducted ...

Underwater Mud Volcanos Are a Haven for Marine Organisms

Jan. 27, 2025 — One would think that a volcano was not the most hospitable place for living organisms. However, the Borealis Mud Volcano, at 400 m water depth, acts as a sanctuary for a number of marine ...

Reducing Irrigation for Livestock Feed Crops Is Needed to Save Great Salt Lake, Study Argues

Jan. 7, 2025 — The Great Salt Lake has lost more than 15 billion cubic yards of water over the past three decades, is getting shallower at the rate of 4 inches a ...

Lead Pollution Likely Caused Widespread IQ Declines in Ancient Rome, New Study Finds

Jan. 6, 2025 — Lead exposure is responsible for a range of human health impacts, with even relatively low levels impacting the cognitive development of children. ...

New Method Turns E-Waste to Gold

Jan. 2, 2025 — A research team has developed a method for extracting gold from electronics waste, then using the recovered precious metal as a catalyst for converting carbon dioxide (CO2), a greenhouse gas, to ...

A Greener, Cleaner Way to Extract Cobalt from 'Junk' Materials

Dec. 10, 2024 — As the demand for lithium-ion batteries escalates with the proliferation of mobile phone, electric vehicles and even pacemakers, key components in these powerhouses, like cobalt, face significant ...

Ripples of Colonialism: Decarbonization Strategies Perpetuate Inequalities in Human Rights

Oct. 25, 2024 — A new study of a city in the Democratic Republic of Congo finds that the necessary process of decarbonization is repeating and recreating colonial ...

Heavy Metals in the Ocean Become More Toxic

Oct. 9, 2024 — Toxic trace elements such as lead, mercury, arsenic, and cadmium naturally occur in small quantities in coastal seas. However, human activities, such as industry and agriculture, contribute ...

Despite Progress, China Remains Tethered to Coal as Climate Change Pressures Mount

Oct. 8, 2024 — A new paper details how China faces numerous political, economic and technological obstacles as it tries to transition away from coal while balancing the need to combat climate change with the need ...

Mystery of Uruguay's Amethyst Geodes: New Model to Explain Amethyst Formation

Oct. 2, 2024 — Amethyst is a violet variety of quartz which has been used as a gemstone for many centuries and is a key economic resource in northern Uruguay. Geodes are hollow rock formations often with quartz ...

Metal Exposure Can Increase Cardiovascular Disease Risk

Sep. 18, 2024 — Metal exposure from environmental pollution is associated with increased calcium buildup in the coronary arteries at a level comparable to traditional risk factors, according to a new study. The ...

How Plant Communities Change When Conquering Uninhabited Ground

Sep. 17, 2024 — Some plants are able to take over uninhabited spaces like sand dunes, volcanic substrates and rockfall areas. The first colonizers have specific traits that allow them to grow in such hostile ...

Just How Dangerous Is Great Salt Lake Dust? New Research Looks for Clues

Sep. 6, 2024 — Scientists determine sediments from the lake's growing exposed playa have elevated 'oxidative potential,' indicating greater risk to human health compared with sediments from other ...

Study Shows How Oceans Are Key to Addressing Global Challenges

Sep. 4, 2024 — Research shows how oceans can be used to help address major challenges such as the shortage of antimicrobial medicines, solutions for plastic pollution and novel enzymes for genome ...

How a Salt Giant Radically Reshaped Mediterranean Marine Biodiversity

Aug. 29, 2024 — A new study paves the way to understanding biotic recovery after an ecological crisis in the Mediterranean Sea about 5.5 million years ago. Researchers have now been able to quantify how marine biota ...

Oxygen Produced in the Deep Sea Raises Questions About Extraterrestrial Life

Aug. 26, 2024 — Rocks are generating 'dark oxygen' in an area being explored for deep-sea ...

Environmental Laws Failing to Slow Deforestation

Aug. 20, 2024 — Australia's environmental laws are failing to stop high rates of tree clearing to make way for agriculture, development and ...

Thousands of Birds and Fish Threatened by Mining for Clean Energy Transition, Study Finds

July 26, 2024 — Our increasing demand for metals and minerals is putting over four thousand vertebrate species at risk, with the raw materials needed for clean energy infrastructure often located in global ...

Researchers Warn of Unprecedented Arsenic Release from Wildfires

July 23, 2024 — The wildfire season of 2023 was the most destructive ever recorded in Canada and a new study suggests the impact was unprecedented. It found that four of the year's wildfires in mine-impacted ...

Deep-Ocean Floor Produces Its Own Oxygen

July 22, 2024 — An international team of researchers has discovered that metallic minerals on the deep-ocean floor produce oxygen -- 13,000 feet below the surface. Discovery challenges long-held assumptions that ...

A Breakthrough in Inexpensive, Clean, Fast-Charging Batteries

July 3, 2024 — Scientists have created an anode-free sodium solid-state battery. This brings the reality of inexpensive, fast-charging, high-capacity batteries for electric vehicles and grid storage closer than ...

Near Chromosome-Level Genome of the Mojave Poppy Bee

July 2, 2024 — Scientists have developed a near chromosome-level genome for the Mojave poppy bee, a specialist pollinator of conservation ...

Trout in Mine-Polluted Rivers Are Genetically 'Isolated'

May 30, 2024 — Trout living in rivers polluted by metal from old mines across the British Isles are genetically 'isolated' from other trout, new research ...

Can Coal Mines Be Tapped for Rare Earth Elements?

May 20, 2024 — A team of geologists analyzed 3,500 samples taken in and around coal mines in Utah and Colorado. Their findings open the possibility that these mines could see a secondary resource stream in the form ...

Scientists Develop New Geochemical 'Fingerprint' to Trace Contaminants in Fertilizer

May 17, 2024 — An international team of scientists has revealed high levels of toxic metals in global phosphate fertilizers using a isotopic variants of the element strontium as a tracer to uncover metals in soil, ...

Copper Can't Be Mined Fast Enough to Electrify the US

May 15, 2024 — Copper cannot be mined quickly enough to keep up with current U.S. policy guidelines to transition the country's electricity and vehicle infrastructure to renewable energy, according to a new ...

Making Batteries Takes a Lot of Lithium: Some Could Come from Gas Well Wastewater

May 15, 2024 — A new analysis suggests that if it could be extracted with complete efficiency, lithium from the wastewater of Marcellus shale gas wells could supply up to 40% of the country's ...