An innovative methodology for assessing the environmental and economic efficiency of integrated mineral resource utilization is presented. Its validity, alongside the notable shortcomings of traditional approaches, is demonstrated through a comparative analysis of theoretically possible processing models for multicomponent ores and a specific numerical example. Compared with conventional methods, the proposed approach substantially broadens the economically viable scope of integrated resource use, enabling mining enterprises to grow economically while stabilizing or reducing raw material extraction. This paves the way for a shift from a resource-extractive model to a resource-efficient, environmentally balanced development paradigm.

A critical review and synthesis of domestic and international literature on the characteristics, patterns, and methodological approaches for evaluating the economic efficiency of combined, multiproduct utilization of natural and anthropogenic mineral resources [1–17, etc.] indicate that the principal contributions to the scientific foundations of technology, rational subsoil use, and combined resource utilization were made by domestic scholars and practitioners, including M.I. Agoshkov, A.S. Astakhov, A.Kh. Benuni, V.I. Vernadsky, V.N. Vinogradov, T.A. Gatov, I.M. Gratzershtein, V.T. Kalinnikov, G.D. Kuznetsov, V.N. Lexin, N.V. Melnikov, S.A. Pervushin, V.A. Reznichenko, K.N. Trubetskoy, V.A. Fedoseev, A.E. Fersman, V.A. Chanturia, and others.

However, researchers’ perspectives on the highly complex fundamental and applied aspects of rational subsoil use and integrated processing of multicomponent mineral raw materials have evolved over time under varying socio-economic conditions. These viewpoints are often industry-specific, departmental, and occasionally contradictory. The terms “primary” and “by-product” (secondary, accompanying) components are widely used in literature and practice but frequently fail to reflect their true significance for specific enterprises or, especially, the national economy, due to a lack of rigorous scientific basis. Key methodological challenges in differentiated cost assessment and evaluating the economic efficiency of extracting and producing each valuable component—particularly by-products—remain underexplored, ambiguous, and debated, necessitating theoretical reconsideration, synthesis, and further development within modern market conditions.