Developing a rehabilitation plan for mined out areas in Tiira.

Abstract

This study was carried out to develop the rehabilitation plan of mined out areas in Tiira town council, Busia District. Surface mining methods around the area over time has caused much damage on the environment which has left the surrounding with many abandoned pits, heaped waste rock stockpiles, unconsolidated soils/rocks among others, as a result, several accidents occur from time to time leading death of humans and animals, loss of agricultural production, loss of surface/top soils, surface and groundwater pollution. In order to develop the rehabilitation plan, the materials excavated from the sites were characterized, mapping of the mine sites was done and appropriate landforms were designed. Quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection and processing were used achieve the main purpose of the study and the include; particle size distribution, soil pH analysis, GPS surveys, Microsoft excel, AutoCAD Civil 3D, ArcMap among others. Base on the materials characterization, the soils available on site can support plant growth with an average pH ranging between 6.83and 6.92