Environmental impact assessment of gold underground leaching technology

Abstract The research assessed an impact of the underground gold mining (GM) on snow cover, surface and ground water of the industrial site and the adjacent area. It has been established that the water of observation wells located downstream the terrain contains specific pollutants typical for the GM technology. The snow cover contains dust, heavy metals, arsenic and some light organochlorine compounds, which are components of GM solutions. The article also gives recommendations on monitoring and assessment of the environmental impact of the PoE technology.