The Environmental Problems in Development and Utilization of Urban Mines: Taking Secondary Copper Production as a Case

The great amount of resource consumption and the depletion of metal rich primary ores are the main driving forces to develop and utilize the valuable resource hiding in urban mines. Although urban mining possesses several advantages such as lower energy consumption, less cost and easier to develop and less pollution than conventional primary mining, the various wastes generated in the urban mining become a burden for the society because of poor organization production and the implementation of the strict environmental regulations. This paper investigated the environmental problems and the wastes characterization in development and utilization by taking secondary copper as an example. The main pollutants discharged in secondary copper production were exhaust gas containing POPs and metals, waste water of heavy metals and acid water, and the residues of melting and electrolytic plants. The toxic pollutants like heavy metals asked for appropriate dumping and disposal to prevent the damage to the environment.