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Dec
27
The article is here.
What those levels mean isn’t clear or made clearer in the article. Much is made of the water downstream not being dangerous and the idea that the heavy metals will drop to the bottom of the river and then a system can be set up by which the safe water flows over that bottom without getting contaminated.
I don’t understand it all, but I don’t trust it either. This kind of incident is why we don’t trust – first TVA said that the pond that broke was not over capacity, but now that they’ve tripled the estimate of what was released, and that amount is more than double the capacity of the pond, it appears that the pond was in fact over capacity.
I’m a newbie to this, but the roll out of the information alone is not reassuring. Am I the only one who finds the uncertainty expressed by the very people hired by our government to manage such facilities and problems as completely bizarre and, frankly, unacceptable? I’m not interested in saying/hearing that it’s no surprise. We should be surprised and we should demand more. Don’t go off on what the people get in exchange – what do they get in exchange? A 30 year shorter life expectancy and death by cancer (several articles reported that the incidence of cancer is hundreds of times higher in these areas than elsewhere in the country).
Enlighten me.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 11:02 am December 27th, 2008 in Energy, Environment, Government, Health Care, Media, Politics, Social Issues, Utilities
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11 Responses to “Tennessean reports elevated levels of thallium, lead in water at TN coal ash disaster”
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Shalom Jill,
As someone who grew up in coal country I can assure you of one thing: if the government or a coal company tells you that anything having to do with the extraction of coal is safe, you can bet the mortgage that your life is in serious danger.
These people lie the way you and I breathe.
B’shalom,
Jeff
“enlighten me” she says. OK, how about this: The Bush Administration
Why would plant or facility mangers at a power plant not care? If they say hey look this retaining pond is not structurally sufficient and needs to be rebuilt, what do we think happens and why?
People are cowards and greedy, that facility manger may not have addressed it, second guessed the corporate offices. I would say it has to be done and then take the blows for doing what is correct.
Then consumers are like retarded colicky babies, if you raised rates to ensure their safety they cry, if you do not and they are threatened still crying. They see none of it, its all abstract to them they only see the disaster in the paper or the results in the bill.
The EPA is like a paper tiger, an inspector probably gets removed by command of a senator or congress person, through the “power network” for taking a stand.
Then you have this huge knowledge gaff, ninety nine percent of the voices at the base of the relative knowledge curve. They are what overtly concerned with others think and how that may affect them and their position or even their perception of themselves.
I would say the facility manager get penalized or terminated, then if they covered their ass they sue the corporation. The EPA inspector also gets the grill over this, and either penalized or fired. Then the political representation that exist for the region called out on the rug. The question is why does the federal EPA fail and why are you not held responsible for that?
FWIW, here is the Tennesse Valley Authority’s take on the disaster. (For those who may not remember, the TVA notes that it is “a wholly-owned, but self-funded agency of the U.S. government” created by The TVA Act of 1933.)
Wasn’t thallium the substance that caused defects in children in Britain? (The place I remember hearing about it first) Physical defects like not completely formed arms, etc.
Did it again…
Nope, I’m thinking thalidomide. Oops…
Thallium – cardiac stress testing, still low level radioactive. Here’s a “fact sheet” on thallium from the EPA.
Outside of the entire article not being at all reassuring, I liked this sentence: “Metals found in coal are often concentrated in the ash when coal is burned.” Ah – so much for ‘clean coal’ eh?
The pond…retains what is in the ash in the water, that is how they contain what is in the ash. Burning coal creates other elements and precipitators and scrubbers collect and retain, the pond is or was pollution control that failed.
If you really want to take this all apart, then consider what you pay for a kilowatt. I believe Ohio pays about $.08 and Indiana pays $.55 cents.
Is it possible to burn coal and not create any by products? No. Is it possible to completely contain and or reprocess all by products? Perhaps. What is absolutely for sure is that it would cost more to do it.
If it cost more then it affect other cost functions, part of manufacturing costs is energy, if you raise the rates they choose other states to manufacture.
Wind is not consistent neither is solar, demand is not either, adding variables increases costs. The wind blowing must be countered with a decrease in generation from the primary source. Steam powered electric turbines do not turn on and off efficiently related to the wind blowing. Adding turbines adds costs, adding controls to stage and regulate generation adds more costs. Then consider that NEO has excess capacity for generation and also an outdated transmission grid. What gets generated and what is actually used can be a variance of 30%, it gets lost in transmission.
A state of the art transmission grid, underground and one that requires far less maintenance. Then upgrading or replacing legacy generation with state of the art generation.
Were there is a coal mine there should be a generation plant. That plant should be isolated from residential populations and accessible though rail, the rail should ride on underground state of the art transmission lines. Those connecting to the interstate that also should be railed. The goods moving to and from aligned with the power grid, that propels it.
State of the art highly efficient sustainable lower maintenance infrastructure. The department of energy and the department of transportation combined? Do we really think slapping some windmills on a 1950 power grid will save the planet?
It will require massive rebuilding, not demolishing spaces, but clearing spaces for redevelopment, prefectures based on demand based an mathematical determinations.
Space the use of space, the price of space, the metrics of those that occupy the space. When we collect garbage we should charge by the pound.
It’s not close to perfect world…but it could be.
“Clean coal” doesn’t mean that the coal itself is somehow cleaner, it means that the byproducts — particulate smoke/ash and carbon dioxide are the main concerns — are “cleanly” captured and stored somewhere. For example, in this case (as far as I can tell) ash is stored in a lake and the contaminants settle down to the bottom and don’t leach into the water supply.
But that’s a very, very theoretical description of a “clean coal” setup. In reality, storage of byproducts is imperfect and accidents will happen. Clean coal simply isn’t clean. (I will admit, it’s certainly cleaner than coal power plants from 100 years ago. But calling it clean is just plain misleading.)
The only safe level of poisonous materials is zero, really. That’s basically impossible to achieve, even if there was zero pollution from people, so there are “allowable” levels of contaminants (which can be argued over ad nauseum). Whenever you hear that argument starting, it’s a good idea to be concerned and suspicious!
The difference between carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide is what?
Then you have to understand the concept of ramping up, adding energy.
Taking what is toxic and adding other elements and energy can produce what is inert.
Clean or not clean is an absolute it does not pertain to the realm of science and engineering.
Actually what is toxic to humans has levels that can exist for which its toxicity is not relevant.
The problem is when you add financial gains and losses and correlate them with safety and they are. Then you have those that are responsible to maintain the level safety allowed to accept financial and personal gains to favor them. Unfortunately the experts the real experts are chemist and engineers and they are all employed by and subject to the system as it is.
I suppose those that do not understand should be suspicious and concerned, they certainly will never be able to address the problem concisely, they just convolute it.
Coal can be augmented with clean energy, energy that is not consistent used to address the processing of byproducts. It can be converted to liquid with byproducts that are produced by burning it, its stored energy. It actually more than likely to be used in the future, the C02 can be split with solar energy and then augmented with hydrogen, what may seem to be a problem may in fact be the solution.
It’s complex but the government should invest in solar and wind, but not as primary they are not reliable they are viable in processes that remediate byproducts, into something that is portable energy like a liquid or gas.
That or go back to subsistent economies like they have in Africa and all that goes along with that.
Keep it up your results will be doubling or tripling in prices and nothing will change. The new set of lies are on the horizon, you add windmill and you will get nothing but a higher electric bill and the same emissions. The extra electricity cannot be integrated yet, the promoters are liars as well. When they say I do not understand why or what we are waiting for, they answer and ask a question.
What do we have in Ohio? In nuclear plants? They only increased the cost of electricity and they are about at the end of their life cycles. http://www.ratical.org/radiation/CNR/PP/app7.html
Look at the costs per state of electricity, look at Kentucky all coal and cheapest no nuclear and cheapest. The west Virginia and Idaho no nuclear and cheapest. Idaho is less expensive because they have damn, or they burn coal, they use no nuclear.
http://www.ohiocoal.org/projects.htm
http://www.ohio.edu/ohiocoal/
http://www.ohioairquality.org/ocdo/ohio_coal_story.asp
Update the transmission grids and do that with rail expansion, link transportation with energy. Land zoning, residential, commercial, industrial, agricultural and parks.
The entire state should mandate regional governments at the county level, it all needs to be restructured it’s dysfunctional. It’s all smoke and mirrors and con-games, waste full and inefficient.
The only safe level of poisonous materials is zero, really.
Not always. Concentration often matters. For example, iron, copper, zinc, selenium and certain other metals are necessary human nutrients. However, if the concentrations are too high, they are poisonous.
However, if the concentrations are too high, they are poisonous.
…as is water.