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How are Diamonds commonly mined?

Surface or open-pit mining requires extensive blasting, as well as rock, soil, and vegetation removal to reach mineral deposits. Waste rock, or overburden, is piled away from the mine. Benches are cut into the walls of the mine to provide access to progressively deeper ore, as upper-level ore is depleted. Ore is removed from the mine and transported to processing plants for concentration.

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Minerals Extraction
The extraction of minerals requires the removal and disposal of overburden, a layer of soil, vegetation, and rock. Waste rock generated in both surface and underground operations is removed and usually disposed of in impoundment areas or is used to backfill mines. Wastewater is generated from the use of water to suppress dust, wash away waste from the working zone, and cool excavation machinery such as drills. Dusts are generated from the cutting, drilling, sawing, and blasting required to remove the rock. Explosives used in excavation contain mixtures of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil. Hydrocarbons used in machinery as lubricants and fuels can be sources of pollution.

Pollutants from Crushed Stone
The source of crushed stone is usually a deposit of relatively solid rock such as limestone, dolomite, trap rock, granite or sandstone. Dust emissions occur from many operations in stone quarrying and processing. Dust is released when rock and crushed stone products are loosened by drilling or blasting them from their deposit beds. Dust is also released when the loosened rock is loaded into trucks by power shovels or front-end loaders. Transporting the quarried material to the processing plant generates dust from the rock inside the truck and from the road. Sources of dust at the processing plant include the dumping of rock into primary crushers; primary, secondary, and tertiary crushing; screening; transferring rock by belt conveyor; loading rock onto storage piles from conveyors; and wind blowing dust from storage piles and open conveyors.

Particulate matter produced during stone quarrying and processing is usually of relatively large particle size. The chemical composition of the dust tends to be homogeneous since its ancestry is the rock formation from which the rock deposit was taken.

Air pollution control techniques for stone quarrying and processing plants include wetting the material and/or surfaces; covering open operations to prevent dust entrainment by the wind; reducing the drop height of dusty material; and using hooding, industrial ventilation systems, and dust collectors (e.g., baghouses) on dusty processes amenable to enclosure. Dust recovered from air pollution control systems is often a valuable product in road building and other construction operations.

Ecosystem Mitigation Measures

Link with all stakeholders from the local population and workers, to environmental groups, regulatory agencies, and stockholders.

Employ sediment retention structures to minimize amount of sediment migrating off-site

Employ spill prevention and control plans to minimize discharge of toxic/hazardous materials into water bodies

Site roads, facilities, and structures to minimize extent of physical disturbance

Avoid construction or new disturbance during critical life stages

Minimize use of fences or other such obstacles in big game migration corridors; if fences are necessary, use tunnels, gates, or ramps to allow passage of these animals

Use "raptor proof" designs on power poles to prevent electrocution of raptors

Use buses to transport employees to and from mine from outer parking areas to minimize animals killed on mine-related roadways

Limit impacts from habitat fragmentation, minimize number of access roads, and close and restore roads no longer in use

Prohibit use of firearms on site to minimize poaching.

because diamond bearing material has already limited growth of vegetation, replant site with species comfortable in a metaliferous environment (Source: USA/EPA)

Canadian law has strict guidelines covering all aspects of the mining industry.