Periodic Reporting for period 1 - MOSMIN (Multiscale observation services for mining-related deposits)
Berichtszeitraum: 2024-01-01 bis 2025-06-30
Mining is essential to supply the raw materials required by modern economies to ensure the green and digital transitions. Mining also generates large volumes of rock wastes and tailings that pose environmental and safety risks, such as instability, water and soil contamination, and dust emissions. Increasing incentives to reduce wastes, demand in critical raw materials and bottlenecks in supply chains, mine wastes are now appraised as potential valuable secondary resources that could contribute to the circular economy and reduce the need for primary extraction. MOSMIN (Multiscale Observation Services for Mining-related Deposits) predicates that an improved assessment, monitoring and evaluation of mine wastes is necessary to address these challenges. MOSMIN will thus develop integrated solutions combining satellite Earth Observation, UAV-based surveys, and in-situ geophysical data and enhanced by advanced analytics and machine learning. MOSMIN aims to develop full-site monitoring services that provide reliable, actionable insights on geotechnical stability, environmental health, and resource potential of sites anywhere on Earth to warrant commercial and stakeholder uptake. MOSMIN will test, refine and demonstrate workflows at pilot sites in Europe, South America, and Africa to ensure the viability of the proposed solutions. MOSMIN will guarantee a significant impact by developing products for the early detection of hazards, a more efficient and reliable monitoring of mining activities, and accurate evaluations of wastes as resources. MOSMIN will contribute to Europe’s ambitions in boosting responsible metal sourcing, sustainable industrial practices and circular economy.
MOSMIN has already built a strong foundation for the delivery of integrated services that combine geotechnical stability assessment, environmental monitoring, and resource characterisation during the first half of the project. The first focus was set on advancing technical workflows, validating methods across diverse pilot sites, and laying the groundwork for future operational and commercial deployment. Innovations concern the geotechnical monitoring of mine sites. Satellite-based deformation measurements combined with ground-based seismic data and distributed acoustic sensing to provide a better understanding of the structural behavior of tailings facilities. Data integration 1) improves the early detection of instability, 2) enhances the understanding of subsurface processes that drive surface deformation and 3) contributes to more reliable risk assessments. The second contributions focussed on the environmental monitoring of mine wastes. We established integrated workflows to 1) track acid mine drainage from source to sink, 2) assess vegetation health and phenology, and 3) monitor dust and aerosol emissions. Workflows were tested at multiple pilot sites and validated with targeted field campaigns, to ensure the delivery of accurate, scalable insights into environmental changes. Thirdly, MOSMIN improved the detection of valuable secondary materials and deleterious components in tailings and waste rock, supporting both sustainable waste management and circular economy applications. We also demonstrated that multi-class change detection and volume estimation from satellite data are key to map the evolution of the footprint and volumes of mine waste deposits. These workflows are invaluable to plan valorisation strategies and assess potential recovery volumes. MOSMIN developed a new digital tool, which provides multi-scale visualisation, time-series analysis, and user-driven analytics. MOSMIN’s platform is key to process complex data and display relevant and insightful information for operators, regulators, and other stakeholders. Finally, MOSMIN is dedicated to maximize impact and transfer. An extensive market validation has confirmed the strong demand for integrated, user-friendly monitoring solutions that combine geotechnical, environmental, and resource insights. Current practices are often fragmented and rely heavily on traditional sensors, underscoring the value of MOSMIN’s modular, data-driven approach. These findings are informing the ongoing design of a customer-focused business model and guiding the early steps toward a go-to-market strategy.
MOSMIN is redefining how mining-related risks and impacts are monitored by combining satellite Earth Observation, UAV-based surveys, and in-situ measurements into a single, integrated framework. This multi-scale approach provides a whole-system view of mining sites, capturing processes triggering environmental and geotechnical changes and tracking their impacts. MOSMIN is also driving technological innovation to ensure the integration of the most relevant data. New workflows improve the density and reliability of satellite-based deformation measurements and open up new possibilities for high-resolution mineral mapping with novel long-wave infrared hyperspectral UAV-based sensors. MOSMIN is also pioneering the integration of distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) with satellite-based surface observations to ensure an improved understanding of subsurface changes related to surface deformation and stability. MOSMIN combines in-situ technological innovations with novel multi-temporal hyperspectral satellite datasets and rigorous field validation. MOSMIN delivers versatile, reliable and actionable insights outperforming traditional, single-parameter approaches. Multi-scale data integration enables the early detection of hazards, informs more effective mitigation strategies, and provides a stronger scientific basis for safer and more sustainable mining operations. Central to this vision is the MOSMIN digital platform, which supports the integration of multi-scale data and enables advanced time-series analytics and interactive visualisation. The platform ensures that robust scientific data analytics translate into practical, user-driven information. This processing and visualisation platform is dedicated to operators, regulators, researchers, and communities to support data-driven decision-making and contribute to responsible and resilient resource management.