Wheal Jane is a disused

tin Tin is a chemical element; it has symbol Sn () and atomic number 50. A silvery-colored metal, tin is soft enough to be cut with little force, and a bar of tin can be bent by hand with little effort. When bent, a bar of tin makes a sound, the ...

mine near

Baldhu Baldhu (; , meaning ''black mine'') is a village and parish in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It is in the civil parish of Kea. The parish church of Saint Michael and All Angels, designed by William White, is the burial place of Billy Bra ...

and

Chacewater Chacewater () is a village and civil parish in Cornwall, England, UK. It is situated approximately east of Redruth. The hamlets of Carnhot, Cox Hill, Creegbrawse, Hale Mills, Jolly's Bottom, Salem, Saveock, Scorrier, Todpool, Twelve ...

in West

Cornwall Cornwall (; or ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is also one of the Celtic nations and the homeland of the Cornish people. The county is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, ...

, England, United Kingdom. The area itself consisted of a large number of mines.

History

Wheal Jane was probably seriously worked for

from the mid-18th century. Given the complexity of

ore Ore is natural rock or sediment that contains one or more valuable minerals, typically including metals, concentrated above background levels, and that is economically viable to mine and process. The grade of ore refers to the concentration ...

formation Formation may refer to: Linguistics * Back-formation, the process of creating a new lexeme by removing or affixes * Word formation, the creation of a new word by adding affixes Mathematics and science * Cave formation or speleothem, a secondary ...

near

granitic A granitoid is a broad term referring to a diverse group of coarse-grained igneous rocks that are widely distributed across the globe, covering a significant portion of the Earth's exposed surface and constituting a large part of the continental ...

emplacements, amounts of

arsenic Arsenic is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol As and atomic number 33. It is a metalloid and one of the pnictogens, and therefore shares many properties with its group 15 neighbors phosphorus and antimony. Arsenic is not ...

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

silver Silver is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag () and atomic number 47. A soft, whitish-gray, lustrous transition metal, it exhibits the highest electrical conductivity, thermal conductivity, and reflectivity of any metal. ...

and

zinc Zinc is a chemical element; it has symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodic tabl ...

were also worked at some time. In around 1885, most of the nearby mines became uneconomic. Wheal Jane was able to struggle on for a few years, principally due to its arsenic revenue, but it too succumbed in around 1895. It re-opened in 1906 as part of Falmouth Consolidated, with a modernisation and cost reducing agenda, but it was to close again within a decade. Work recommenced at low intensity in the run up to

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

but interest was turning to more modern processing techniques to recover more tin from what was already available and the old mine spoil was re-worked until 1946. It was re-opened again in 1969 and much development work was done underground and in improving the surface processing facilities and ownership eventually passed to

Rio Tinto Zinc Rio Tinto Group is a British-Australian multinational company that is the world's second largest metals and mining corporation (behind BHP). It was founded in 1873 when a group of investors purchased a mine complex on the Río Tinto, in Huelv ...

. Like the remainder of Cornwall's tin mines ( Geevor, Pendarves and

South Crofty South Crofty is a metalliferous tin and copper mine located in the village of Pool, Cornwall, England. An ancient mine, it has seen production for over 400 years, and extends almost two and a half miles across and down and has mined over 40 ...

), it was dealt a body blow by the end of the International Tin Agreement in 1985 and the subsequent collapse of the world tin price. It never really recovered and the pumps were finally switched off in early January 1992.

Aftermath

Wheal Jane was not out of the news though; these were the days before

Environmental Impact Assessment Environmental impact assessment (EIA) is the assessment of the environmental impact, environmental consequences of a plan, policy, program, or actual projects prior to the decision to move forward with the proposed action. In this context, the te ...

s. With the pumps no longer de-watering the mine,

groundwater Groundwater is the water present beneath Earth's surface in rock and Pore space in soil, soil pore spaces and in the fractures of stratum, rock formations. About 30 percent of all readily available fresh water in the world is groundwater. A unit ...

levels rose and flooded the former working areas, picking up waste, washing over the exposed rock faces and contaminating the groundwater. These eventually overtopped the drainage systems in January 1992 and

acid mine drainage Acid mine drainage, acid and metalliferous drainage (AMD), or acid rock drainage (ARD) is the outflow of acidic water from metal mines and coal mines. Acid rock drainage occurs naturally within some environments as part of the rock weatherin ...

rose through the abandoned mine, escaped into the surface water systems, and flowed into the

Carnon river The Carnon River () is a heavily polluted river in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It starts in Chacewater. Both Trewedna Water and River Kennall flow into the Carnon before it merges with Tallack's Creek to become Restronguet Creek, which ...

and eventually into Falmouth Bay, killing fish and contaminating wild fowl. By 1994, remedial measures including the construction of large settling ponds, were in place. By 2002 the water treatment had cost more than £20 million.

Mineral Statistics

From Robert Hunt's ''Mineral Statistics of the United Kingdom.''

References

External links

{{Commons category
Wheal Jane Group

Cornwall Record Office Online Catalogue for Wheal Jane
History of Cornwall Mines in Cornwall Tin mines in Cornwall Industrial archaeological sites in Cornwall

History

Aftermath

Mineral Statistics

See also

References

External links