A Black Mound of Canadian Oil Waste Is Rising Over Detroit

[Judi Lynn]

A Black Mound of Canadian Oil Waste Is Rising Over Detroit
By IAN AUSTEN
Published: May 17, 2013



WINDSOR, Ontario — Assumption Park gives residents of this city lovely views of the Ambassador Bridge and the Detroit skyline. Lately they’ve been treated to another sight: a three-story pile of petroleum coke covering an entire city block on the other side of the Detroit River.

Detroit’s ever-growing black mountain is the unloved, unwanted and long overlooked byproduct of Canada’s oil sands boom.

And no one knows quite what to do about it, except Koch Carbon, which owns it.

The company is controlled by Charles and David Koch, wealthy industrialists who back a number of conservative and libertarian causes including activist groups that challenge the science behind climate change. The company sells the high-sulfur, high-carbon waste, usually overseas, where it is burned as fuel.

More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/18/business/energy-environment/mountain-of-petroleum-coke-from-oil-sands-rises-in-detroit.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&_r=0

[dipsydoodle]

1. Reminds me of Herräng in Sweden.

That's a village about 100km north of Stockholm which is taken over by anything up to a thousand swing dancers from across the world each July / August for 5 weeks. Its a now defunct iron mining area and there was an iron smelter up the road on the coast. The "beach" is like lunar landscape, roughly the same height as picture in Detroit , from the residual debris from the smelting process which is like very coarse sand. Its reckoned that in the course of 100 years or so it will all be washed out to sea and just become the sea bed.

[n2doc]

2. F**king Koch-roaches

Poisoning everything they can get their hands on. If that river floods, we, the taxpayers, will have a hell of a mess to clean up. I suspect the taxpayers will end up having to clean up that site anyway, with the inevitable toxic leachate contaminating the ground.