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- Changing Social Perceptions on Mining-Related Activities: A Key Challenge in the 4th Industrial RevolutionPublication . A., MateusWe are living in a period of multiple and accelerating changes where new uncertainties emerge constantly. Guidelines for economic growth are changing, social demands and environmental concerns are growing, and technological advancements are succeeding at rates never seen before. The main drivers of these changes are mostly related to digitization, decarbonization and dematerialization processes of economies, which follow the recent improvements achieved in biotechnology, digital networks, software design, and information and communication technologies. The ongoing technological (r)evolution includes continued linear progressions of solutions of widespread use along with innovations of exponential increase that will significantly shape the future and have potential to influence the current social and cultural patterns. However, all these transformations stimulate the reliance on a large number of minerals and metals whose increasing demand cannot be fulfilled on the basis of reuse, recycling and/or substitution practices. In other words: the full development of digital, eco-efficient and low-C intensity economies with higher levels of automation will require considerable inputs of raw materials derived from primary resources to balance the demand/supply ratio, filling the gaps of material stocks and flows in the economy that are not provided by secondary sources, even when suitably managed. So, mineral exploration and mining will remain fundamental in the completion of pathways to the future, as occurred throughout the history of human civilization. Notwithstanding this evidence, clearly demonstrated in many studies, the access to mineral resources are becoming increasingly difficult worldwide and mining-related activities are even more perceived negatively by society.
- Towards a multi-dimensional methodology supporting a safeguarding decision on the future access to mineral resourcesPublication . A., Mateus; Lopes, C.; Martins, L.; Carvalho, J.A multi-dimensional methodology is proposed to delimit areas hosting mineral resources of public importance (MRoPI). The assessment procedure considers the Level of Geological Knowledge (LGK) along with the Economic (Ec), Environmental (Ev) and Social Development and Acceptance (SDA) dimensions. Different sets of independent, but complementary and variably weighed, criteria support the appraisal of each dimension, and a final score (MRoPI r ) results from a reasonable balance between LGK and (Ec + Ev + SDA). A ranking based on MRoPI r will fall in the [1, 10] interval, as imposed by the scaling normalising factor, but only specific tracts having MRoPI r ≥ 4 display LGK values confident enough to be covered by a safeguarding decision at a given time. Adequate MRoPI r mapping can also be done, interpolating within the kriging formalism and evaluating thoroughly the modelling results until achieving the final map. The methodology application shows in addition that the combined use of LGK, Ec, Ev and SDA allows to address suitably two overlapping and coexisting, although different, issues: (1) safeguarding the future access to mineral resources and (2) planning the mineral development in the short-medium term, recognising the need of assigning specific areas to mining activities.