Use of marble and pyritic wastes in soil remediaton

Mining is usually a big scale operation and large amounts of wastes are produced in every corner of the world. The wastes so produced are not only a loss in material and money but also cause serious environmental problems if not properly handled. In recent years, there have been efforts to reduce the mining wastes and/or benefit from them as alternative raw materials. Studies were carried out to utilize two different mining wastes, namely copper and marble wastes, in different application areas. It was found that pyrite wastes from copper concentration plant can be utilized to remediate the alkaline and calcareous soils, and marble wastes can replace agricultural lime to increase the pH of acidic soils. In this paper, results of these studies have been summarized.