The Illinois State Geological Survey at the Prairie Research Institute recently received a $10 million award to inventory abandoned mining sites that could be reclaimed to improve community safety and the environment in Illinois.
The work will document mined-out-areas in the state and help support the reclamation of those areas. The five-year renewable funding from the Federal Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill was awarded through the Illinois Department of Natural Resources Office of Mines and Minerals’ Abandoned Mined Lands Program.
“The importance is straightforward for the people of Illinois: Reclamation of abandoned mine sites means an improvement in the environment and community safety for the state of Illinois,” said Scott Elrick, geologist and head of the ISGS bedrock geology section. “And delineation of old spoil piles means potential new resources for economic growth, as well as potential economic incentives to clean up the piles.”
The Abandoned Mined Lands Program project will build on previous ISGS work, using extensive historical research, field work, mapping, and leveraging aerial imagery and lidar data to gather information that can be integrated into the public website, ILMINES, and investing resources in that tool.
“One of the fundamental functions of ISGS is to provide unbiased information to the public, industry, communities, and government,” Elrick said. “This project allows us to increase the efficacy of our information delivery efforts and will be greatly expanding the scale and scope of that available data.”
The project will also identify former coal waste and mining waste piles to both environmental and economic benefit for the state. Many of those piles contain potentially extractable amounts of rare earth elements and critical minerals, and their removal would allow the cost of cleanup to be offset by an economic benefit.
Finally, the project will develop an online and portable application to allow county planners, highway assessors, emergency management, and planning/zoning professionals to quickly report problematic abandoned mine lands or mine-related issues.
