A decision-support system for post-closure mine reutilization: Criteria-based ranking integrating technical and socioeconomic constraints

Coal phase-out policies and the accelerating deployment of renewable energy are driving the progressive closure of underground coal mines, leaving large subsurface volumes and surface infrastructure that are commonly sealed and abandoned. Selecting an optimal reuse concept can be difficult because alternatives range from energy production and storage to underground research facilities, tourism, and industrial logistics, and each option is constrained by mine-specific geology, depth, hydrogeology, temperature and humidity, water inflow, and the surrounding market and community context. This study develops a transparent, mine-specific screening framework that prioritizes post-mining reuse options. A structured narrative review defines 15 reuse pathways and derives option-specific application criteria. For each pathway, “best-case” benchmark conditions are formulated to enable consistent scoring across mines. Site conditions are compared with these benchmarks and rated. Criterion weights were obtained using an expert survey, and aggregates were normalised for comparability. The approach is then demonstrated for the Pniówek hard-coal mine in Poland. The methodological contribution is a mine-level, option-specific benchmark architecture that places technically dissimilar underground reuse pathways in a common and auditable screening structure. Unlike regional land-use inventories or methods tailored to a single technology, the framework combines spreadsheet-based min–max normalisation of the technical and infrastructure branches, explicit missing-data and evidence-quality reporting, a non-compensatory safety gate, and transparent weighted aggregation. The Pniówek application is illustrative rather than a final feasibility assessment: Underground Gas Storage (UGS), Mine Water Geothermal (MWG) and Compressed Air Energy Storage (CAES) form the leading screening shortlist, while UGS and other pressure-storage options remain subject to site-specific verification of containment, fault connectivity and post-closure hydrogeological evolution. Sensitivity tests show that UGS remains first under the tested perturbations, whereas MWG and CAES should be interpreted as an effectively tied second group. The framework therefore supports transparent prioritisation but does not replace geomechanical, hydrogeological, legal, economic or stakeholder-specific feasibility studies.