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Photos of the Hungarian toxic sludge disaster

by whateverpedia
14 replies
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Pictures speak a 1,000 words.

A flood of toxic sludge - The Big Picture - Boston.com
  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    1,000 words? More like a book to rival the size of War and Peace.

    I wonder exactly HOW toxic that stuff is and how the heck they are going to clean it up enough to be safe.

    Everyone is worried about natural disasters - but the ones that seem to be real long term nightmares have human signatures. Even Haiti - which seemed to be a natural disaster, would have been a moot point had the gov done as it should have to move people out of the area and make sure they had stable buildings.....because they had expected that quake for awhile and knew it was coming and knew they needed to get people out or sure that area up or it would happen. So what could have been just another of the 17 or so 7 mag quakes in a year, it was turned into a major disaster.


    I saw somewhere a prediction (please don't ask me where, I don't remember. Google it maybe you'll find it) that in the coming years man-made disasters would become far worse than natural ones. After all of the really ecologically bizarre catastrophes just this year, I kind of think that this is a very good prediction.
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    Sal
    When the Roads and Paths end, learn to guide yourself through the wilderness
    Beyond the Path

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    • Profile picture of the author whateverpedia
      Originally Posted by HeySal View Post

      I saw somewhere a prediction (please don't ask me where, I don't remember. Google it maybe you'll find it) that in the coming years man-made disasters would become far worse than natural ones.
      I would like to say you're dead wrong on that.

      I really would like to say it.

      Sadly though I suspect that prediction is spot on, so I can't.
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  • Profile picture of the author KenThompson
    If you want to read some interesting stuff, check out the comments under
    the pics. A few doozies like when all that mud starts to dry out. It's full
    of heavy metals that will of course become airborne to some degree.


    Ken
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  • Profile picture of the author theentry
    Damn it's the next country from here, sucks big time
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  • Profile picture of the author seasoned
    WOW, ANOTHER reason to hate aluminum! Oh well, the aluminum company I invested in, ALCOA, soon divested much of its holdings, and I sold it.

    As for haiti, they basically PLANNED for a disaster. Hey, they got what they planned for.

    Steve
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  • Profile picture of the author sarahberra
    Yikes! That is so sad. We haven't heard much about the oil spill here in the U.S. for awhile now. Just another mess!
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    • Profile picture of the author seasoned
      Originally Posted by sarahberra View Post

      Yikes! That is so sad. We haven't heard much about the oil spill here in the U.S. for awhile now. Just another mess!
      THIS mess was caused by processing bauxite for aluminum though! WHY did they have such corrosive stuff so open anyway? And they should have had some type of containment that was solid and resistant.

      One trade magazine says:

      ...
      To be fair this isn’t the aluminum industry as we know it. The plant in question refines bauxite to produce special calcined aluminas and aluminum hydroxides, synthetic zeolites and gallium for sale in central and western Europe for refractories, ceramics and a wide range of aluminum containing chemical reactants. This is not, nowadays anyway, a plant for producing alumina for aluminum smelting.
      ...
      A table of analysis from samples of red mud taken from the Etibank Aluminium refinery suggest the color comes from the high iron oxide content. More disturbingly the report goes on to say the waste can contain thorium and uranium and confirms it can be highly caustic. The majority of the constituents are relatively harmless, iron oxide, aluminum oxide, silica and sodium, titanium and calcium oxides. It’s the minor constituents and caustic ph of this sludge that could prove to be the most dangerous contaminants.
      ...
      Hungarian Alumina Refinery Disaster – What Exactly is This Red Mud?

      Steve
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      • Profile picture of the author GeorgettaSterling
        Originally Posted by seasoned View Post

        THIS mess was caused by processing bauxite for aluminum though! WHY did they have such corrosive stuff so open anyway? And they should have had some type of containment that was solid and resistant.
        Pretty much all tailings ponds are "in the open." They ARE supposed to have containment (typically plastic lined pond with concrete and earth-bermed walls) and most ponds do.

        From reading the story, the first issue I see is that the tailings pond was somehow elevated (in order to cause a flood when the berm failed). Why is this containment pond elevated, and so much higher than the surrounding area? Most modern containment ponds are situated in low-lying areas or excavated to lower their elevation. I suspect it is because they are saving on pumps and electricity - a low-lying pond needs more pumping to reclaim tailings water, while an elevated pond takes advantage of gravity.

        A lot of these pond operators also dramatically overfill their tailings ponds. They just keep heaping up more soil around them and then put more tailings in. That is a regulatory issue, and an engineering issue. I don't know if that was the case here.

        As far as how "caustic" this was, red mud is really only moderately caustic. The plant operators try to reclaim as much caustic soda from the tailings as possible to re-use in the Bayer process. Caustic soda is expensive, and they lose money if they do a bad job controlling pH.

        To put it into perspective, most Bayer red mud is about as caustic as cement or slaked lime. That might be part of the problem - it doesn't burn instantly when it touches your skin. People let it sit on them, and then get a nasty chemical burn before it starts to hurt. I have had that crud on me, and DID get a small burn before I noticed it. It wasn't worse than the burn I got from, say, cementing some fence posts, but of course you have to be aware of the risk and have plenty of fresh water to flush away the caustic material.

        They also HAVE to maintain a certain relatively high pH (around 12.5) on these tailings in order to keep metals from leaching into tailings water. Most mine water treatment systems also use high pH (from slaked lime) to precipitate metals from the water so it is safe for discharge.

        As for "toxic heavy metals" people do need to remember that this is essentially clay with the aluminum components removed. So, any "toxic heavy metals" are concentrated by, say 50%, but they were all there in the original ore/deposit. I wouldn't worry about the heavy metal exposure if it were me - I would worry about the physical devastation and about the dust when this stuff dries and starts blowing around (it is very fine).

        The thing that should worry people more is that there are hundreds of red mud tailings ponds in the world. Many are abandoned. What is happening with all of those?

        Bayer red mud has been a serious problem for the aluminum industry since the Bayer process was invented, and in all these decades, there are no long term solutions for dealing with it, beyond just leaving it in a tailings pond and hoping for the best.
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  • Profile picture of the author seasoned
    WOW, pretty complete georgetta. You didn't contradict anything I actually said though. If it were only up to just below ground level, a relatively cheap plastic liner would be ok. Built ABOVE the ground, a failure in the wall will make the plastic burst under the weight of the mud. If they want to use gravity, they can simply build that part lower still. And a lot of the remaining waste has value, and most, in this case, could be easily extracted. So the idea of remaining waste shouldn't be that bad.

    Steve

    Steve
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    • Profile picture of the author GeorgettaSterling
      Originally Posted by seasoned View Post

      And a lot of the remaining waste has value, and most, in this case, could be easily extracted. So the idea of remaining waste shouldn't be that bad.

      Steve

      Steve
      Steve, I am pretty sure I have seen hundreds of papers proposing various processes to treat red mud and extract value from it. A few red muds have fairly high gallium content, which has some significant value too. The problem is that no one has developed a process that is economically feasible. The cost of processing and equipment is higher than any valuable metals extracted from the red mud.

      Part of the difficulty is that it is so high in iron hydroxide, which makes it very difficult to treat hydrometallurgically, and requires enormous amounts of energy and fluxing agents to treat pyrometallurgically.

      As for "gravity feed" - I mean, if you build your pond on a hill, then you can use gravity to drain the excess water from the pond, and have very small pumps. If you build the pond in a valley, then you have to have big pumps to drain the water and pump it UP to your processing plant. Some of the mines in Chile are specifically designed to take advantage of gravity since the mine is essentially on top of a mountain. They sometimes put tailings ponds even further up the mountain, so that they don't have to pump the water back to the mill.

      Of course, if the tailings pond berm fails, the mill will be destroyed, and perhaps all the miners killed, but some organizations don't consider this to be such a big deal. Mining is a very short-term activity, based on an asset whose value drops as you use it (a wasting asset). Generally mining companies want to mine and process as fast as possible to maximize cash flow, deplete the mine while beating all the equipment to dust, and then leave for the next mine.
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  • Profile picture of the author HeySal
    Actually, the first thought I had when I saw the size of the lake of that stuff was why the hell are they letting that lake of swill get that huge?

    It would seem like something toxic and that large should not be allowed to exist.

    Georgetta - I know how mining works and the attitudes - here in the West, you wouldn't believe how actually conscientious mining companies are. But that damned ocean that they had diked up, shouldn't have been allowed to get that big - especially if there is uranium in it. I don't worry about aluminum. If people realized how much aluminum ore there is in soil generally they'd probably start having cows over that, too -- but when you start getting radioactive waste, it needs to be contained. It seems like there might have been some consideration that pulling those elements out of the swill wouldn't actually be mining costs, but clean up costs with the benefit of at least a partial pay back for cleaning it up. Exactly how much waste are we expected to allow a company to produce before they do a little clean up? If they can make even half the cost back from the clean up - why should they whine about cleaning up a mess that size in the first place? Look at how dwarfed the car on that road around the containment wall looks - that thing was unbelievably huge -- and radioactive? Great.

    This company is as damned irresponsible (or evil, whichever) as BP.
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  • Profile picture of the author KenThompson
    I read the wall of red mud when it burst was 12 ft high. There
    was also something about another type of sludge/mud/swill that
    is gray and much denser. If that one broke lose it would level
    houses due to the density.

    The river the red mud polluted is only 45 miles from the Danube.

    That company should be prosecuted, no question.

    And nuclear power is dangerous.


    Ken
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  • Profile picture of the author seasoned
    heysal,

    Yeah, I KNOW. Aluminum ore, as I recall, is THE most common type on the planet. Various radioactive ores aren't nearly as common, but THEY obviously exist also.

    The fact is that you can't worry about that. That is just part of living on Earth. And YEAH, I HATE the idea of aluminum because society is even FEEDING it to people! But frankly, I wouldn't be worried about any of THAT here really, The mass, moisture, and PH are far worse here. THAT is what is destroying and damaging things. If I am reading stuff right, the amount of radioactive elements is FAR less than 8%. Assuming the analysis shows the most prevalent things, less than .02% is radioactive.

    And most of it is a very low radioactivity. The most dangerous things are contained now because it is wet. That ALSO affords some protection against the radiation.

    I guess what I am saying is that if people worry about none of the other things, why worry about radiation?

    Steve
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  • Profile picture of the author GeorgettaSterling
    @KenThompson - there is no nuclear power involved here. The radioactive components in red mud are naturally occurring in much of the soil in Hungary (and all over the world, including your back yard). Basically, the bauxite ore is reddish brown dirt that is strip mined, the alumina is removed, leaving the iron, silica, some clays and all the minor metals that were originally present in the dirt.

    I am definitely NOT an apologist for mining companies (having worked in that industry for about 14 years) but if they had a drought and a windstorm, people would have been exposed to the same dirt. Or if they had a regular flood, landslide, etc. The difference is that this stuff is moderately caustic and finer than the original dirt was.

    If the tailings pond was only 12 feet high, then that would be a "baby." I didn't pay that much attention, but I think that the pond in Vaudreuil that I saw was 2 or 3 times that deep/high (but it is mainly excavated - the levee isn't that tall). The tailings pond retaining wall at Antamina, Peru (lead-zinc mine, not alumina) is 130 meters tall (420 feet tall). Oh, and it is on top of a mountain. Imagine a dam 2/3 the height of the Hoover dam, except holding back sloppy mud rather than the Colorado River.

    @HaySal - yes, some mining companies are socially and environmentally conscious. They all CLAIM to be so. Generally the rhetoric and claims far outweigh their actions in that area. The people who work for mining companies are generally good, honest, responsible, hard-working people (like me!). The senior managers appear to at least sometimes be complete sociopaths. Not just in mining, of course.

    Aluminum oxides of various forms are everywhere. Aluminum is the most abundant metal in the earth's crust, and the third most abundant element. All dirt, all "clay" is largely made of various alumino-silicates. Most rocks contain at least some. I don't know why anyone would say that aluminum exposure would be an issue with this red mud disaster in Hungary - there is very little in that mud (the whole point was to remove the alumina from the bauxite, leaving red mud as a residue or waste).

    I hope that they hold the company accountable for this incident. Obviously they played fast and loose somehow. Accidents happen, but generally, if you have an elevated tailings pond, job one is to continuously ensure its structural integrity. They obviously didn't. These things don't tend to fail without warnings. Inspections usually give clues years in advance. I recently looked at a hydro dam (I'm not a structural engineer, just there to offer some materials and corrosion advice) and while it is still sound, there are tell-tale signs of future failure. It will all be fixed years before there will be any problem or actual risk - they make repairs every year to head off "problems" that wouldn't be serious for at least another decade.

    I don't know for sure but I suspect that these folks in Hungary ignored problems and warning signs. That, along with shoddy operation, happens a lot right now in Eastern Europe. That said, here in my little town someone's back yard disappeared a few months ago. They live about 6 blocks away from me. An old mine shaft (from gold mining operations about 100 years ago) caved in, causing part of their backyard to drop about 8 feet. There are a lot of legacies from mining, even though we couldn't live without it!

    G
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