Excerpt from Plant Materials for Use on Surface-Mined Lands in Arid and Semiarid Regions Lands that have been mined and drastically disturbed can seldom be returned to their original condition. According to Box drastically disturbed areas are those in which the native vegetation and animal communities are removed and most of the topsoil is lost, altered, or buried. Box says, The process of rebuilding a plant community must start from a new growth medium, usually a mixture of subsoil, rocks, and soils. The natural process often must be helped by artificially introducing new plant communities or by altering the conditions under which new plant communities may develop. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This SME classic is both a reference book for the working engineer and a textbook for the mining student. This hardcover edition gives a brief history of surface mining and a general overview of the state of surface mining today--topics range from production and productivity to technological developments and trends in equipment. This extremely useful text takes the approach that exploration and mining geologists must be expert in a number of fields, including basic finance and economics, logistics, and pragmatic prospecting. Readers will find material on all these topics and more. The book's nine chapters include: Introduction, Exploration and Geology Techniques, Ore Reserve Estimation, Feasibility Studies and Project Financing, Planning and Design of Surface Mines, Mine Operations, Mine Capital and Operating Costs, Management and Organization, and Case Studies. The book is fully indexed.