Gold Mining Facts

Gold Mining isn't such a popular subject as 101 gold facts among the aesthetically gifted, ending their day's work with aperitifs in porticoed wine-bars. Don't even think about telling them Pamela's story, the one about getting flecks of gold from a river somewhere in the South Pacific.

To get a taste of this subject, a good place to start is with the movie that exposes the stain of blood DIAMONDS, staring Leonardo Dicaprio, it's titled - Blood Diamonds. If you haven't already seen it, get out the DVD and check out for yourself the history behind that brand spanking new diamond ring you picked up cheap on holiday.

So what are the gold MINING facts then in down to earth language?

In this current global economic meltdown, buying gold in the form of outright physical gold ownership, seems cool enough, but for those still sitting on the fence and want to know about gold mining in plain simple English before investing in physical gold the following facts about the gold mining industry are kinda shocking but essential to know. Got your hard hat on? We're going down and getting dirty from here........

The ongoing operations of large scale mechanized mining that some mining companies use is destructive to both the land and to adjacent aquatic ecosystems. Ecosystems?

Basically, an ecosystem is a specific area of size in which climate, landscape, animals and plants are constantly interacting. Ecosystems sustain life and so you don't have to be a rocket scientist to work out that our ecosystems are very, very important.

Gold-mining, specifically, open-pit mining and some of the methods used to extract the gold threaten our ecosystems.

The rest of this article drives past the bling of new gold jewelry to find, there's a sting in the tail end of that brand-spanking-new-gold diamond engagement ring you were swooning over (blood diamonds are just as dirty).

Get the Facts About Diamonds Here.

And consider the benefits of choosing an environmental friendlier jewelry alternative such as Antique Gold Jewelry and Natural Persian Gulf Pearls instead?

Here are the gold-mining facts that all gold consumers should know, most do not:

➨ Did you know that 1 new gold ring generates 20 TONS of mine waste?

➨ Did you know that each ton of gold mined today costs 1 life and 12 serious injuries? (1996, Pik Botha, the South African Minister for Mineral and Energy Affairs at the time).

➨ Did you know that modern mining methods displaces whole communities?

➨ Contaminates drinking water?

➨ Destroys pristine environments?

➨ Did you know that smelters pollute the air we breathe and add 142 million tons of sulfur dioxide to the atmosphere every year - 13 percent of global emissions?

➨ Did you know that 99 percent of the children in the Peruvian town of La Oroya (where there is a smelter that produces gold bullion bars, silver, lead cadmium, zinc and copper) have severe lead poisoning and 20% of these children need urgent medical attention?

➨ Did you know that water and air pollution create other problems, forcing families to spend large amounts of money from their meagre incomes treating asthma, skin diseases and many other sicknesses.

➨ Did you know that artisanal gold mining is one of the highest sources of mercury being released into the environment in the developing world? At least, one quarter of the world’s total gold supply comes from artisanal mining.

➨ Did you know that industrial accidents from mining involving spilled chemicals can completely devastate communities like Cajamarca in Peru?

➨ Did you know that gold mining is no longer a stronger generator of jobs and thankfully is rapidly declining?

➨ Did you know that gold is a non-renewable resource and can only be taken out of the ground once? Once the gold deposits have been depleted, most of these large-scale operations typically poison thousands of hectares, leaving in its wake, a devastating landscape, rubble-strewn land drained by acid streams?

➨ Did you know that mining operations are usually set up without the consent of local communities, Indigenous people and farmers?

➨ Did you know that forced removals, physical attacks and loss of livelihoods associated with gold mining and land expropriations are serious human rights violations?

➨ Did you know that the Glamis Gold Ltd. mine proposal in California will destroy over 50 sacred sites of the Quechan Indiann nation?

➨ Did you know that even when surface land rights are clearly titled to Indigenous groups, governments often sell of the subsurface rights to mining corporations?

➨ Did you know that gold mining is a major threat to large tracts of undisturbed forest called "frontier forest"?

➨ Did you know that advanced gold mining methods are increasing pressure on governments to permit mining in otherwise unprofitable mining areas, putting even more areas under risk?

➨ Did you know that gold mining methods that involve digging-up ore generates massive amounts of waste?

➨ Did you know that one gold method involves a method call "heap leaching". This method involves dripping a cyanide solution though huge piles of ore. The solution strips away the gold and is collected and then run through an electro-chemical process to extract the gold?

➨ Did you know that 99.9% of these huge toxic heaps are waste dumps and are so large they they can reach as high as a 30 story building and take over whole mountain sides.

➨ Did you know that cyanide used in leaching gold is extremely toxic? One rice-grain size dose of cyanide can kill humans? Did you know cyanide and other chemicals used in mining pollutes rivers and water sources and kills fish other wildlife?

➨ Did you know that some miners regularly dispose of toxic waste in rivers, lakes and even oceans? Mine waste also includes byproducts such as mercury and heavy metals which work their way into the food chain and make people and animals very sick.

➨ Did you know that mining is one of the most dangerous jobs in the world. Rock falls, tunnel collapses, fires, heat exhaustion claim the lives of over 15,000 miners every year?

Investing in antique gold jewelry that leaves no carbon footprints makes not only financial sense but environmental good sense and keeps our ecosystems smiling too.

Reference: No Dirty Gold

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