Monday, April 29, 2013
In November, a resident who lives near the shores of Lake Michigan saw chunks of coal and a metallic sandy material. The DNR's final report said that given the make-up of the substances, it didn't come from We Energies.
Department of Natural Resource officials say the chunks of coal and a powdery metallic substance that washed up along the shore of Lake Michigan last November didn't come from We Energies, according to a story in the Journal Times. The DNR's findings are consistent with the preliminary findings, which at the time had found that the black sandy substance was magnetite and the chunky objects were coal. But the question remained - because of its proximity to the We Energies Oak Creek Power Plant and the bluff collapse in 2011 - where did these substances come from? According to the Journal Times story, the coal "was burned years ago" and "is likely either coal that was burned by a power plant years ago or from a coal-fired vessel, like the …
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
Chunks of coal and black powdery material washed up along the Caledonia shoreline. The DNR says coal may have fallen off a barge years ago and the black powdery stuff is magnetite, not coal ash.
A resident living just south of We Energies' Oak Creek power plant says she has been seeing quite a bit of what she believes is coal ash as well as chunks of coal washing up along the shores of Lake Michigan. The chunks of coal were wedged between the rocks on the beach, but there was also a powdery metallic substance in the sand. But an official with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources says the powdery stuff on the shore probably is not coal ash, which contains arsenic, lead, mercury and other chemicals and has been linked to cancer. The coal on the beach, however, is indeed coal. After the We Energies bluff collapse in 2011, the company dredged the water to remove as much of the coal ash as they could and then they dumped it …
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Cleaning up after 25,000 cubic yards of coal ash slid down a bluff after it collapsed, We Energies officials are putting it into a landfill in Caledonia they've operated since 1988.
Want to read more about this topic? Click the Facebook "like" button above this article. If we get 10 or more than 10 "likes," we'll know to write a follow-up story. Contractors cleaning up 25,000 cubic yards of coal ash and debris from the bluff collapse at the We Energies power plant in Oak Creek are dumping it into their landfill in Caledonia. Brian Manthey, a spokesman for We Energies, said the company has used the landfill since 1988 as a holding area for coal and coal ash waiting to be recycled. The bluff collapse at the We Energies power plant last week exposed coal ash from the 1950s and 1960s. Officials with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and We Energies said the impact on human health would be minimal. However, …
Thursday, November 3, 2011
We Energies officials say coal ash isn't toxic, but an environmental group headed by physicians disagrees.
Want to read more about this topic? Click the "like" button just above the article. If we get 10 or more "likes" on a story, we'll know to write a follow-up story. The bluff collapse at the We Energies power plant Monday exposed coal ash from the 1950s and 1960s, and that has rekindled a debate over EPA standards and the health risks of coal ash. Officials with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources said the impact on human health would be minimal because only an estimated 10 percent of the coal ash made it into the lake. However, the debate over the health implications of coal ash are further underscored by a report by Barbara Gottlieb, an associate professor at Harvard and also the director of environment and health director for …
Tim
4:54 pm on Tuesday, April 30, 2013
Do a search on Wikipedia for Magnetite. Interesting mineral, locations include the midwest, and it removes 2 types of arsenic from water. Didn't even know there were different types on arsenic! more ›