Sixteen coal ash pits contaminating Texas groundwater: report

[JacksinPA]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...nating-texas-groundwater-report-idUSKCN1PB0CD

HOUSTON (Reuters) - Sixteen coal ash pits in Texas are leaking contaminants including arsenic, boron, cobalt and lithium into groundwater, according to a report released on Thursday by the Environmental Integrity Project.

Coal ash is the residue left after coal has been burned to generate power, and can include sludge from plant exhaust stacks. Coal ash is placed in pits or ponds next to coal power plants.
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One major reason coal-fired electric power plants are going the way of the dodo. Like spent nuclear fuel rods, this stuff is hazardous & has to be safely stored indefinitely.

 

[Rogue Valley]

Have no fear, Andrew Wheeler will do battle with such pollution! /s

 

[Tom Horn]

Some idiot tried to clean out a coke oven while it was still hot and CW was sued over it. bd about the pits. ( did you know Centralia PA was the entity that set their coal mine on fire ? )

 

[joko104]

No, it is not like spent nuclear power plant radioactive rods. Not even close.

 

[bongsaway]

Now, with that said, isn't it about time for some more deregulation to help kill ourselves and our planet?

 

[PirateMk1]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...nating-texas-groundwater-report-idUSKCN1PB0CD

HOUSTON (Reuters) - Sixteen coal ash pits in Texas are leaking contaminants including arsenic, boron, cobalt and lithium into groundwater, according to a report released on Thursday by the Environmental Integrity Project.

Coal ash is the residue left after coal has been burned to generate power, and can include sludge from plant exhaust stacks. Coal ash is placed in pits or ponds next to coal power plants.
===============================================
One major reason coal-fired electric power plants are going the way of the dodo. Like spent nuclear fuel rods, this stuff is hazardous & has to be safely stored indefinitely.

All of which are useful naturally occurring elements. The lithium is worth a bit of money as is the cobalt.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

All of which are useful naturally occurring elements. The lithium is worth a bit of money as is the cobalt.

Now factor in the cost of recovery, right at the moment it isn't a good enough ROI, which is largely why it just gets dumped instead. Surely you must understand that if the ROI was high enough, markets would be tripping over each other with solutions to recover these elements. It is the groundwater equivalent of "flared nat gas".

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

All of which are useful naturally occurring elements. The lithium is worth a bit of money as is the cobalt.

Minor detail you must have missed, none of these elements "naturally occur" as concentrated heaps of "tailings" that are dumped in hazard level concentrations into groundwater aquifers, otherwise aquifers would be pillaged as mining sites.

You're apparently very fond of an almost "dickensian" way of laughing off legitimate environmental concerns.
You're the thirsty guy at the hearing who gets offered a glass of water, trucked in specially from a contaminated aquifer, and just like in a few famous movies, when you are informed of the source of that glass of water, suddenly the look on your face is priceless because you dare not raise the glass to your parched lips.

Some "pirate" you are...you live in a Barc-A-Lounger, safely insulated from the consequences of your promoted beliefs.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

"arsenic, boron, cobalt and lithium" (also mercury)
One major reason coal-fired electric power plants are going the way of the dodo. Like spent nuclear fuel rods, this stuff is hazardous & has to be safely stored indefinitely.

They can be safely stored until the market price of these elements is sufficiently high that companies will invest in recovery methods to refine and sell them. In the meantime, they do indeed need to be kept out of groundwater.

Lotsa luck here in Trumplandia.