Abstract Tailings facilities and associated waters often generate major environmental concerns due to the contaminant potential of the solids and the resulting acid mine drainage. The present study is focused on an area with mining tradition in the department of Santander, Cordillera Oriental - Colombia, where the evolution of mine tailings from gold exploitation resulted in acid mine drainage. An integrated approach led to a global characterization to the tailings and associated waters, including petrography, mineralogy, geochemistry, and hydrogeochemistry methods. The obtained results indicated that mine tailings are composed of sulfides (primarily pyrite with minor chalcopyrite, sphalerite, molybdenite, and galena), barite, silver, goethite, rare earths elements minerals, iron and titanium oxides, associated with quartz, muscovite and feldspar. The mine tailings are mainly in the silty range, and fire tests emphasized their compositional heterogeneity, namely for gold and silver, with the spatial distribution throughout the facility remaining unknown. Geochemical static tests, such as neutralization potential and acidity potential, allow the classification of these mine tailings as acid generators, as per the physical-chemical properties of the water samples. These samples were characterized before and after treatment with natural zeolite-rich tuff and siliceous sand with different weight ratios and days of duration of the experiment. Initially, chemical analyzes in the water showed an acidic pH of 2.96, high concentrations of sulfides (162 mg S-2/L) and Fe (10.41 mg Fe/L), being classified as high-acid, high-metal water. The column experiments revealed that the best relationship for remediation of this contaminated water was the one with the highest zeolite content, obtaining neutral pH values close to 7 and iron values on average

中文翻译：

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利用天然富沸石凝灰岩和硅砂处理废弃金矿尾矿矿井水

摘要 尾矿设施和相关水通常会产生重大的环境问题，因为固体的污染潜力和由此产生的酸性矿井排水。本研究的重点是哥伦比亚东科迪勒拉桑坦德省的一个有采矿传统的地区，该地区金矿开采尾矿的演变导致了酸性矿山排水。综合方法导致对尾矿和相关水域的全球特征描述，包括岩石学、矿物学、地球化学和水文地球化学方法。所得结果表明，尾矿由硫化物（主要是黄铁矿，少量黄铜矿、闪锌矿、辉钼矿和方铅矿）、重晶石、银、针铁矿、稀土元素矿物、铁和钛氧化物组成，并伴有石英、白云母和长石。尾矿主要在粉质范围内，火灾测试强调了它们的成分异质性，即金和银，整个设施的空间分布仍然未知。根据水样的物理化学性质，地球化学静态测试，例如中和电位和酸度电位，允许将这些尾矿归类为产酸剂。这些样品在用天然富含沸石的凝灰岩和不同重量比和实验持续天数的硅质砂处理之前和之后进行表征。最初，水中的化学分析显示酸性 pH 值为 2.96，硫化物 (162 mg S-2/L) 和 Fe (10.41 mg Fe/L) 浓度高，被归类为高酸、高金属水。