Paper short abstract:

Humans have for millennia relied on microorganisms and growing plants to mine natural resources. This paper examines historical examples of biomining and phytomining. As such, we hope to improve our understanding of such operations' potential contribution to sustainability in the extractive sector.

Paper long abstract:

Microbes have for long played important roles in human economic activities through their use in a variety of sectors. Some of these have often been overlooked, particularly in those sectors where human actors have for long been unaware of their more-than-human co-workers. The mining sector is an example.

As the mining sector is expanding into new frontiers of extraction (from outer space to the deep sea), another frontier is hidden within the low-grade ore that is normally left behind by mining companies. Among the methods to extract valuable resources from these low-grade ores, technologies using bacteria, other microorganisms and growing plants – processes known as biomining and phytomining — have recently gained prominence. Industries suspect that these technologies may represent a cleaner and environmentally sound extraction method while offering the possibility of recovering uneconomical ore bodies.

This contribution dives into the histories of biomining, examining cases from the past where extractive actors, knowingly or unknowingly, relied on biomining and phytomining to extract mineral resources. The paper is based upon interdisciplinary literature on both technologies, as well as archival sources on select operations, including companies’ and international organizations’ reports. By providing an overview of the sites and processes where biomining and phytomining have successfully or unsuccessfully been employed, we hope to present lessons regarding the long-term sustainability of such operations, and examine the socio-economic configuration of human and non-human actors in these processes of extraction.