A survey dataset to identify industry practices and challenges for mine rehabilitation completion criteria in Western Australia.

The development of acceptable and achievable completion criteria is fundamental to the successful relinquishment of mined land to a post-mining use. Despite the central role of completion criteria, there is still a need to build capacity and understanding of how to set targets and develop measurable completion criteria that are accepted by all stakeholders involved. The work described in this paper aimed to elicit industry practice, barriers, and opportunities for the development of feasible and acceptable completion criteria. We developed a quantitative survey that was administered online. The target respondents consisted of mining companies, consulting businesses, and relevant regulators in Western Australia. The survey questionnaire, raw survey data, and summary statistics are provided in this paper to increase research transparency and facilitate reproducibility of the methods by researchers in other jurisdictions.

Identifying industry practice, barriers, and opportunities for mine rehabilitation completion criteria in western Australia.

Around the world, the development of acceptable and achievable completion criteria is a necessary part of mine closure planning and fundamental to the successful transition of mined land to a post-mining use. Without adequate completion criteria, a mining company cannot proceed to the process of relinquishment, which is the ultimate goal of most mine closure processes. Despite the central role of completion criteria, there is still a need to build capacity and understanding of how to set targets and develop measurable completion criteria that are accepted by all stakeholders involved. We investigate how completion criteria are currently developed in one of Australia's major mining jurisdictions: Western Australia. Through an industry consultation process that involved interviews and a survey with a total of 102 participants from mining companies, consulting businesses, and relevant regulators, we highlight key challenges and opportunities that the sector faces to successfully define clear, achievable, and agreed completion criteria. This is one of the few industry-wide investigations to capture and analyze the perspectives of stakeholders involved in writing and assessing mine closure completion criteria. Results show that some major challenges included inconsistent coordination within and between stakeholder groups, a lack of knowledge or data about restoration, and an overreliance on status quo practices and post-mining land uses. Our work shows that ongoing research on ecological restoration and technological innovations is necessary, but that additional organizational and regulatory barriers need to be addressed to achieve a consistent, coordinated, multi-stakeholder approach to define completion criteria and to advance successful mine rehabilitation and relinquishment.

A framework for developing completion criteria for mine closure and rehabilitation.

The mining industry is a major contributor to Australia's economy. However, such returns may come at high environmental and social costs, including loss of biodiversity or heritage values. Thus, companies worldwide are required to rehabilitate mine sites to a state that is safe, non-polluting and capable of supporting an agreed post-mining land use. While national and international guidelines on mine rehabilitation and closure exist, there is a lack of guidance on how to define achievable and measurable criteria that reflect rehabilitation success. This often leads to discrepancies between proponents and regulators, which hinder progression towards mine closure and relinquishment. The purpose of this study was to develop a systematic framework for the definition of completion criteria for mine closure and rehabilitation. The study was informed by a global review of the literature and collaborative research with mining stakeholders from Western Australia. The proposed framework consists of six fundamental steps: 1) selection of post mining land use; 2) definition of aspects and closure objectives; 3) selection of reference(s); 4) selection of attributes; 5) definition of completion criteria; and 6) evaluation of performance. This framework is the first to provide a step-by-step guide for defining site-specific completion criteria and applying a risk-based monitoring approach throughout the life of mine. The framework is applicable across jurisdictions and industries, in Australia and internationally, that require similar rehabilitation of disturbed lands.

Carbon farming economics: What have we learned?

This study reviewed 62 economic analyses published between 1995 and 2014 on the economic impacts of policies that incentivise agricultural greenhouse (GHG) mitigation. Typically, biophysical models are used to evaluate the changes in GHG mitigation that result from landholders changing their farm and land management practices. The estimated results of biophysical models are then integrated with economic models to simulate the costs of different policy scenarios to production systems. The cost estimates vary between $3 and $130/t CO2 equivalent in 2012 US dollars, depending on the mitigation strategies, spatial locations, and policy scenarios considered. Most studies assessed the consequences of a single, rather than multiple, mitigation strategies, and few considered the co-benefits of carbon farming. These omissions could challenge the reality and robustness of the studies' results. One of the biggest challenges facing agricultural economists is to assess the full extent of the trade-offs involved in carbon farming. We need to improve our biophysical knowledge about carbon farming co-benefits, predict the economic impacts of employing multiple strategies and policy incentives, and develop the associated integrated models, to estimate the full costs and benefits of agricultural GHG mitigation to farmers and the rest of society.

Accounting for enforcement costs in the spatial allocation of marine zones.

Marine fish stocks are in many cases extracted above sustainable levels, but they may be protected through restricted-use zoning systems. The effectiveness of these systems typically depends on support from coastal fishing communities. High management costs including those of enforcement may, however, deter fishers from supporting marine management. We incorporated enforcement costs into a spatial optimization model that identified how conservation targets can be met while maximizing fishers' revenue. Our model identified the optimal allocation of the study area among different zones: no-take, territorial user rights for fisheries (TURFs), or open access. The analysis demonstrated that enforcing no-take and TURF zones incurs a cost, but results in higher species abundance by preventing poaching and overfishing. We analyzed how different enforcement scenarios affected fishers' revenue. Fisher revenue was approximately 50% higher when territorial user rights were enforced than when they were not. The model preferentially allocated area to the enforced-TURF zone over other zones, demonstrating that the financial benefits of enforcement (derived from higher species abundance) exceeded the costs. These findings were robust to increases in enforcement costs but sensitive to changes in species' market price. We also found that revenue under the existing zoning regime in the study area was 13-30% lower than under an optimal solution. Our results highlight the importance of accounting for both the benefits and costs of enforcement in marine conservation, particularly when incurred by fishers.