944 These technological developments expand the set of mines where filtered tailings are both feasible and economically competitive. 8.5 Comparative Risk Reduction Relative to Other Technologies Fitton’s review (Paste2024) makes a critical point: among dam-reduced or dam-less storage technologies, filtered tailings and thickened discharge have the strongest operational track record, with most systems performing well over decades. Filter stacking is highlighted as one of the most viable above-ground methods for reducing catastrophic failure risk. When comparing: • Slurry: highest failure consequences due to water retention and large dams. • Thickened: reduced risk but still reliant on embankments. • Paste: improved stability but higher pumping and complexity. • Filtered: eliminates water-saturated mass and minimizes dam reliance. From a purely risk-based perspective, filtered tailings consistently score highest. 8.6 Economic Transparency and Life-Cycle Financial Resilience The unified financial assessment introduced in Benjamin Cox “A unified metric for costing tailings dams and the consequences for tailings management” shows that traditional mine valuation frameworks historically underrepresent long-term risks, closure costs, and environmental liabilities, causing wet options to appear artificially cheap. Once financial models incorporate: • closure obligations, • water scarcity, • environmental liabilities, and • risk-adjusted discounting, filtered tailings frequently emerge as the most financially resilient option over the full mine life, even if they have higher up-front CAPEX. This aligns directly with findings from (Carneiro & Fourie 2019), which show filtered tailings outperform other options under life-cycle, risk-adjusted conditions. 8.7 Synergy With Co-Disposal Strategies Filtered tailings also enable advanced integrated waste strategies. Studies show that filtered tailings: • blend effectively with waste rock near the geotechnical moisture optimum, • reduce ARD risk by lowering oxygen ingress, • improve deposit stability, and • reduce land footprint. Co-disposal therefore strengthens the environmental case for filtered systems. 8.8 Synthesis: Why Filtered Tailings Often Provide the Best Long-Term Outcome Across governance, water, closure, risk, technology, and financial dimensions, filtered tailings repeatedly emerge as the most resilient solution. Filtered tailings uniquely offer: • highest water recovery (critical in arid regions),
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