Mining as a resource for sustainable societies
With the aim to contribute to sustainable development in the Arctic, this project examines how legacies from mining have been handled in Arctic parts of the Nordic countries and why, and under what circumstances such legacies have contributed to sustainability after closure.
History at LTU conducts this project in close cooperation with the Nordic Centre of Excellence REXSAC – Resource Extraction and Sustainable Arctic Communities. At the heart of the project is the material remains of mining, from ecological impacts, waste rocks and tailings to operational equipment, infrastructures and built environments that persist long after the end of mining. In the extraction based regions in the Nordic Arctic there are examples of widely differing approaches to these legacies, from large scale environmental remediation schemes, to active re-use for new purposes, or abandonment, decay and passage out of memory.
In this project, researchers from Luleå University of Technology, KTH-Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm University and the Institute for Arctic Landscape Research (INSARC) at the Silver museum in Arjeplog cooperate to explore how such legacies of mining have been handled in different parts of the Arctic and why. We use approaches from history, archaeology, law, physical geography and cultural heritage studies to explore the role of institutional frameworks, economic factors, the relation of actors to mining legacies, as well as physical and biological processes, in determining the afterlives of mining sites in the Arctic.
Funding agency: Swedish Research Council
Funding: 4.9 MSEK
Duration: 2017-2022
PI: Professor Dag Avango
Project participants: Professor Ninis Rosqvist, Stockholm University
Dr. Malin Brännström, INSARC / Silver museum in Arjeplog
PhD Roine Viklund, Luleå University of Technology
Judit Malmgren, PhD student, Luleå University of Technology
Camilla Winqvist, PhD student, KTH-Royal Institute of Technology
Contact
Dag Avango
- Professor and Head of Subject
- 0920-491573
- dag.avango@ltu.se
- Dag Avango
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