In a week...

[morsla]

In a week, I have seen things I could not have imagined.

Mounds of earth weeping blood-red sulfuric acid into streams that children play by. Pebbles cemented into a metallic pavement by the iron that washes over them. Clear rivers that have lost all biodiversity, void of life for kilometres. Millions of tonnes of mine waste, enough to form a new delta as the river meets the sea - slowly releasing acid and metal into the ocean for thousands of years to come.

I have waded past acid bogs that could be mined for the metals they have accumated. Stood in the freezing rain, measuring the water table along a river. Climbed sand dunes, walked through a lunar landscape of waste rock, and pushed through tree-ferns to find a rainforest waterfall.

A waterfall along the Strahan railway...


Waste water in Haulage Creek, from the Mount Lyell Mine in Queestown - the red is mainly due to dissolved iron. The water drains sulfuric acid, as the mine waste-rock erodes.


Waste water in the Henty Gold Mine wetlands - rather different, I'd say... Henty is a new mine, with a carefully planned environmental management system.


Mount Lyell Copper/Gold Mine, Queenstown. One of their many piles of rubble...


Sand Dunes on the return to Strahan - three kilometres from the coast...


Cradle Mountain on the horizon, with a light cover of snow. I really want to go back - it's been eight years since I climbed it.


I have almost one hundred photos, which will be added to my Pbase gallery over the next few weeks. Some scenes were breathtaking - in others, sulphurous fumes acheved a similar end...

Once, working in restaurants made me wary of shellfish if I hadn't seen them thawed and cooked. Now, I'd prefer to read an assay for copper, cadmium, arsenic, lead, cobalt and zinc before ordering off the menu. Hopeful anglers still try to fish off the Macquarie Delta, just out of Strahan - not realising that the "sand" they walk across is silt from mine tailings.

I had hoped to go walking though western Tasmania, after I finish my thesis. The cool climate and abundant water sources could have made for an easier trip, while tackling the mountains - but I'm not sure how far I'd trust the streams any more. Not all the waterways are polluted, but the hills are pockmarked with past and present mine sites - and not all poisons are as clearly marked as Haulage Creek.

I'm glad that I went. I saw things that I had only ever read about; met a great bunch of people (including sarvihaara, who happened to be checking a livejournal on the computer next to me last night ;) ), and I have remembered why I want to work on the path I've chosen. Without public information, no-one will know what mistakes we have made in the past. Without education, we stand to make them all over again, in our futures. Without some way of studying these mistakes, we will never know where we went wrong.

There's a hell of a lot to learn, but I know where I'm going. And right now, I should stop typing - because I'm going to Canberra. See you at the end of the week...

Comments

[futurelegend.livejournal.com]

That is amazing stuff.

..I'm sure one can buy portable hiking water purifiers these days. of course, how well they work is a different matter.

..if you want a walking companion..?

[bishi-wannabe.livejournal.com]

Cool stuff.

See you Friday night, yes?

[morsla.livejournal.com]

Yup - 6pm. Bring anyone who still sounds interested...

[morsla.livejournal.com]

Oh, you can purify water. But most of the purifiers are concerned with micro-organisms - understandable, I guess, as they can do a lot of damage in their own right.

It's the cyanates, base metals, and heavy metals that are your main problem downstream of a mine. The cyanates are a temporal problem - acutely toxic, but they break down in sunlight. The base metals should precipitate out as the river chemistry changes, and are often visible (like, say, bright red). Certainly anything with chromium or iron will stand out.

The heavy metals are a different kettle of contaminated fish. They're present in low concentrations, but with a chronic toxicity. Pretty much anything that drinks the water accumulates the stuff, predators inherit it from their prey, shellfish just filter millions of litres during their lifespans. The only real solution there is to read the maps thoroughly when you plan the hike...

If it starts to get organised, I'll give you a call. Some time on the Other Side of the thesis, though...

[kikilon.livejournal.com]

What awesome pictures! *envious*
But I guess knowing about more poisons is rather scary... Thanks for the warning!
So, how do you get the metals out? is there any way (that doesn't involve copious amount of hard-to-pronounce chemicals and unliftable machinery)?

I want to go hiking somewhere nice, too....

[peacockangel.livejournal.com]

Beautiful and terrible. In a non-cryptic statement, now: Wow, kind of frightening but also very beautiful. The red of the water makes me think of blood vessles. I guess its like the beautiful pink sunsets, which are caused by pollution.

[morsla.livejournal.com]

Not always pollution from lack of foresight (or stupidity) though... volcanic eruptions can give the whole world a rosy sunset ;)

In the shallow, fast moving sections the water is orange - but anywhere it can slow down, it takes on a darker shade of red. The colours are bizarre...

[morsla.livejournal.com]

Oh, there are plenty of ways to treat any little part of the problem. You can use iron to precipitate out the dissolved copper - but that makes the water more acidic. You could neutralise the acid by adding crushed limestone - but you need to quarry it from somewhere, and neutralising the acid still leaves the metals there.

Lots of circular problems. Nobody has found a perfect solution yet - it's a worldwide problem, though, and each mine has a different combination of compromises.

[kikilon.livejournal.com]

Sounds challenging...
So teh morale is if you hike around there, carry your own water or do the rain dance.

[peacockangel.livejournal.com]

I've seen yellowy-orange water from a heavy concentration of leaves giving off tannin in the water. It was odd looking, but your red rivers sound incredible.