Removing nitrate from mine water

Friday, October 16, 2020 - 2:04 pm

Ben waits patiently to analyze nitrate levels.

Ben is patiently waiting to analyze nitrate in our SmartChem170. Nitrate is a contaminant from blasting residue in the mining industry. YukonU’s Northern Mine Remediation program is exploring how to remove nitrogen from mine water.

Dr. Guillaume Nielsen runs this program out of the YukonU Research Centre and is guided by his seven industrial research partners that make up the Yukon Mining Research Consortium: Newmont Corporation, BMC Minerals Ltd., Victoria Gold Corp., Casino Mining Corp., Selwyn Chihong Mining Ltd. Alexco Resource Corp., and Minto Explorations.

What is a SmartChem170? It is an automated chemistry analyzer that can be used for determining quantities of nitrate, sulphate and various other compounds of interest, primarily used by the Northern Mine Remediation research program.