What a dumb move.
Surely Slartibartfast doesn’t approve
Those are award winning fjords!
All those little fiddly bits.
Norway once again demonstrating that their regard for the environment only extends so far as it does not affect corporate profits.
Social democracy moment
Any ideas what the waste is? Is it quartz, arsenic, plutonium or something else?
Xanthates, Sodium Isobutyl Xanthate (SIBX) to be exact. Originally they planned on dumping 250 million tonnes of the stuff, but after revising their processes they are now planning a “significant reduction” of that, but not specifying how much exactly. Based on that revision they were granted an environmental license in 2020.
The exact impact on marine life is speculative, but I wouldn’t eat anything from that fjord or go swimming there for the next 50 years. It’s pretty toxic stuff.
It breaks down in carbon disulfide, carbonyl sulfide, hydrogen sulfide and hydrogen peroxide.
Edit: Here are some sources: https://web.archive.org/web/20221230071002id_/https://www.scirp.org/pdf/gep_2022122715084300.pdf https://open.uct.ac.za/items/f198e26b-097d-47db-b064-12cd7f306de2 https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11356-016-7905-5 https://www.waterquality.gov.au/anz-guidelines/guideline-values/default/water-quality-toxicants/toxicants/xanthates-2000
And info about the mine itself by Nordic Mining: https://www.nordicmining.com/operations/engebo/
Great job!
Took a quick looking at CSC, and OCS. Pretty spicy stuff!
Later I’ll take a closer look at the sources too.
Concentrating is another big thing in this. If it stays below certain limits, it should be ok. In this case, the limit is probably very low.
