Gold mining is literally sucking the Amazon rainforest dry, creating an environment where trees cannot grow, according to a new study. Researchers found that suction mining not only degrades the soil, ...

From above, the Amazon rainforest appears as a dense, emerald-green paradise, but as the plane descends, the damaged landscape becomes visible with its gaping wounds carved by illegal gold mining.

An aerial view of dredges at an illegal gold mining area in the Amazon region of Peru. Ernesto Benavides / AFP via Getty Images Gold mining has ramped up across the Amazon rainforest in recent years, ...

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Mining often happens in artisanal and small-scale mining operations that burn gold-mercury amalgams to extract gold particles. Credit: Simon Topp. For hundreds of years, the Amazon has been exploited ...

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Forests in the Peruvian Amazon aren’t growing back after gold mining — not just because the soil is damaged from toxic metals, but because the land has been depleted of its water. A common mining ...

Mercury pollution accumulated in trees could offer a new way to keep tabs on destructive gold mining operations in the Amazon rainforest. “We could potentially see whether mining is starting to ramp ...

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — A global mercury conference in Geneva faced sharp criticism Friday from environmental and Indigenous groups for failing to take stronger steps against mercury use in ...

Gold mining in the Amazon removes so much water from the ground that it's too hot and dry for seedlings to survive. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.