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Who said they simply get away with it? BP is responsible for cleaning up the site, at an estimated cost of $150M. They're responsible because they bought ARCO,
by jonas21 5y ago
Who said they simply get away with it?
BP is responsible for cleaning up the site, at an estimated cost of $150M. They're responsible because they bought ARCO, which had acquired the site from the original mining company.
They're the ones who built the water treatment plant that's shown in the Tom Scott video that someone linked to, and either they or Montana Resources (a mining company) are paying for everything shown in this video too.
- andrewstuart 5y agoWhat does "cleaning up" mean? Wouldn't that mean moving the toxic stuff to some other part of the environment?
- londons_explore 5y agoNearly everything toxic can be made non-toxic. Sometimes it's just expensive or hard to do. Sounds like the issues here are heavy metals and sulfuric acid. Both of those are treatable. Presumably just paying this guy is cheaper tho.
- drjasonharrison 5y agoHere the open pit mine creates a huge surface area for the oxidation of metals and then the combination of rainfall and metals. In a working mine, this is the function of a closed loop leaching field.
- readme 5y ago>Wouldn't that mean moving the toxic stuff to some other part of the environment? sounds like we have a problem here
- drjasonharrison 5y agoThe Britannia copper and zince mine in British Columbia Canada, between Vancouver and Whistler, hosts of the 2010 Olympics, was ignored as a source of heavy metals into the ocean. A waste treatment plant, water capture and treatment, and deeper discharge into the ocean led to improved water quality and copper extraction. https://mineclosure.gtk.fi/britannia-mine-british-columbia-canada/ https://mineclosure.gtk.fi/britannia-mine-british-columbia-c... Someday we will process our landfill for their precious metals. Before that we should use insitu remediation to extract currently "unprofitable to extract" metals from closed mines.
- kortilla 5y agoTreating the water and returning it to the environment as clean water. It’s simple chemistry to remove the metals. The process isn’t unknown, it’s just expensive.