Getting it right: regulating mine rehabilitation and closure in Australia for the green energy transition and critical minerals boom

Abstract

A mining boom to extract critical minerals for the global green energy transition is gathering momentum. However, a boom-time mentality may overlook key aspects of up-front design and planning for mine rehabilitation to ensure sustainable operation and closure with beneficial post-mining use. Australia has significant deposits of many critical minerals and, as a prominent mining country, exemplifies the challenge. With few mine closure success stories compared to negative mining legacies in Australia, the literature indicates that mine rehabilitation and closure (MR&C) regulation may be unfit for purpose. Our longitudinal methodology identifies when key mine rehabilitation and closure concepts emerged in regulation. Despite introducing financial mechanisms, rehabilitation standards and in some jurisdictions, mine closure requirements, regulation is fragmentated and at times contradictory, while ambivalence between government and self-regulation persists. Socio-economic aspects of mine rehabilitation and closure regulation remain neglected, though new institutions hold promise of greater attention to cumulative impacts and stakeholder participation as critical mineral extraction accelerates.