Mercury: Byproduct and Source of Contamination of Large-Scale Gold and Silver Mining
Observatorio Latinoamericano de Conflictos Ambientales (OLCA) conducted a literature review and community based research in order to produce a report detailing the contamination and pollution coming from two open pit gold and silver mines in Chile. Among other results, OLCA found that both these mines use a very toxic process (cyanide) for extracting these metals, which has been found to leech mercury and cyanide into the environment. Additionally, workers at these mines were found to have symptoms consistent with mercury poisoning.