The National database on mineral resources
ISPRA has been working on a new geodatabase, called GeMMA, which contains all the relevant information on Italian mining sites such as activities, resources, reserves, production data and closed or abandoned storage facilities containing extractive waste that may still have potentially recoverable elements.
Based on the Minerals4EU project, GeMMA has an INSPIRE compliant architecture, containing the location and information of the mining sites.
The main purpose of the database is to define the situation in Italy of the extractive resources present in the mines and quarries both closed and abandoned and still active, deepening their geological, environmental, cultural and economic aspects.
GeMMA aims to become a valid tool for the development of national and regional policies oriented to the sustainable extraction of primary mineral resources, in a circular economy perspective, also considering the potential exploitation of secondary resources produced.
Mineral resources have been at the center of European policies for years, in fact a sustained growth in the demand for raw materials is expected to meet the expectations of the industrial and social sectors that are compatible with a low carbon economy.
The opportunity to investigate these issues was the launch of the publication of a monothematic issue of the European Geologist (The journal of the European Federation of Geologists) dedicated to the theme "Mineral raw materials in Europe - Chances and challenges for domestic production".
ISPRA, and in particular the Department for the Geological Service of Italy, contributed with an article dedicated to the GeMMA database entitled: "The Italian Database GeMMA: from monitoring production to cataloging mining wastes, a starting point for recovering critical raw materials from abandoned mines? "
(authors: Mauro Lucarini, Roberta Carta, Fiorenzo Fumanti, Lucio Martarelli, Monica Serra).
At the following link you can read the article: https://eurogeologists.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/EGJ49_lr.pdf, pages 27 - 31.
