Seismologists prospect for mineral deposits in Canada by recording the humming vibrations from freight trains.
By Rachel Berkowitz, Physics Today (12 Jan 2021 in Research & Technology)
For the full online article, visit Railways could double as a tool for probing Earth’s shallow crust (scitation.org)
Executive summary: This document reports on the risks identified during field operations carried out in the first year of the PACIFIC project, from June 2018 to June 2019. During this period, two surveys were carried out, one at Stillwater Canada Inc. (SCI)’ s Marathon PGU-Cu Project (“Marathon”), and another one at the Las Cruces site in Spain, an operating mine run by Cobre Las Cruces. The document builds on D5.2 – Environmental and Safety Risk Database adopted in 2018.
The procedures outlined in these documents were implemented during the surveys. No injuries were reported in either survey and impact on the local environment was found to be minimal.
At the invitation of Dr. Andrew Schaeffer (Geological Survey of Canada, Natural Resources Canada), Dr. François Lavoué (UGA) presented the PACIFIC work on the use of seismic signals generated by trains for passive seismic imaging and monitoring on May 5th, 2021. The presentation provided an overview of the activities carried out within the framework of both the PACIFIC and FaultScan EU-funded projects.
The presentation was attended by around 40 people. Technical questions revolved around the parameters controlling signal amplitude, and a more general debate took place on the merits of excluding signals generated by trains from "classic" ambient noise datasets, as is done for earthquakes.
View the PACIFIC project video PACIFIC Project on sustainable mineral exploration - YouTube
An ultimate Charter governing the roles, responsibilities, composition and membership of the Committee will be outlined and implemented prior to the activation of PACIFIC programs.
Click here to download the press release (Pdf format) announcing the online event co-organised by INFACT, PACIFIC and the NHM on December 3-4, 2020.
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