The change in the Ontario Mining Act will permit the recovery of minerals or mineral-bearing substances from tailings and other waste materials resulting from previous mining Operations in Ontario. A recovery permit enables the holder to extract minerals from mine waste without needing an exploration permit or a filed closure plan. If the waste is on Crown land, the permit holder can commercially exploit the recovered minerals without a mining claim or lease. Potentially, there could be a significant number of former mines that operated and closed, whose tailings contain gold or other minerals that could be reprocessed.