Life cycle inventory data for critical mineral mining: Recommendations and new U.S. data 1 compendium

Production and pollution data and information for United States critical mineral mines are heavily 14 fragmented across numerous databases and sources, such as government emissions reports and company 15 documents. These disintegrated data complicate fair and consistent analyses and community 16 understanding of mine operations and their impacts. We aggregated location, production, and emissions 17 data for 19 active critical mineral mines in the United States and developed an interactive data 18 compendium map and data set. We also calculate the ecotoxicity, human health cancer, and human 19 health non-cancer life-cycle impacts of the emissions from these mines. Further, we analyze the proximity 20 of these mines to disadvantaged community tracts identified by the Justice40 initiative. All mines are 21 within 29 miles of a disadvantaged tract. Furthermore, we define a methodology to develop probability 22 distribution functions for mining pollution data to support robust mining life cycle inventory data. We also 23 discuss next steps to expand the data compendium to additional critical minerals and other countries like 24 Australia and Chile.