RT Journal Article
T1 Long term remediation of highly polluted acid mine drainage: A sustainable approach to restore the environmental quality of the Odiel river basin
A1 Caraballo Monge, Manuel Antonio
A1 Macías Suárez, Francisco
A1 Rötting, Tobías S.
A1 Nieto Liñán, José Miguel
A1 Ayora, Carlos
AB During 20 months of proper operation the full scale passive treatment in Mina Esperanza (SW Spain) produced around 100 mg/L of ferric iron in the aeration cascades, removing an average net acidity up to 1500 mg/L as CaCO3 and not having any significant clogging problem. Complete Al, As, Cd, Cr, Cu, Ti and V removal from the water was accomplished through almost the entire operation time while Fe removal ranged between 170 and 620 mg/L. The system operated at a mean inflow rate of 43 m3/day achieving an acid load reduction of 597 g·(m2 day)−1, more than 10 times higher than the generally accepted 40 g·(m2 day)−1 value commonly used as a passive treatment system designing criteria. The high performance achieved by the passive treatment system at Mina Esperanza demonstrates that this innovative treatment design is a simple, efficient and long lasting remediation option to treat highly polluted acid mine drainage.
PB Elsevier
SN 0269-7491
SN 1873-6424 (Elerctrónico)
YR 2011
FD 2011
LK https://hdl.handle.net/10272/23141
UL https://hdl.handle.net/10272/23141
LA eng
NO Caraballo, M. A., Macías, F., Rötting, T. S., Nieto, J. M., & Ayora, C. (2011). Long term remediation of highly polluted acid mine drainage: A sustainable approach to restore the environmental quality of the Odiel river basin. In Environmental Pollution (Vol. 159, Issue 12, pp. 3613–3619). Elsevier BV. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2011.08.003
NO We are grateful to Rich B. Wanty from U.S. Geological Survey for all the corrections and suggestions improving the quality of this paper. This study was funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology through project CTM2007-66724-C02/TECNO and by the Environmental Council of the Andalusia Regional Government. M.A.C. was financially supported by the Spanish Government with an FPU PhD fellowship. We would also like to thank Professor William J. Manning (Editor-in-Chief) and two anonymous reviewers for their comments that significantly improved the quality of this paper.
DS Repositorio Institucional de la Universidad de Huelva
RD 29 may 2026