Bathtub staining from mine water pollution in private home

From a News Report by Gareth Evans, British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), February 11, 2019

[Wyoming County, WV] In the shadow of some of America’s most controversial coal mines, where companies use huge amounts of explosives to blow the tops off mountains, isolated communities say their water has been poisoned.

Now, they must decide if they will fight back against an industry they have relied upon for generations.

Casey wears a one-dollar wedding ring now. She bought the blue plastic band after her original ring was ruined by the toxic water that has been pumping into her home for more than a decade. “I just needed something there,” she says, as she holds the replacement ring up to the light. “I felt empty without it.” She places her original wedding band, now discoloured and corroded, in her palm. Her skin, especially on her hands, has become coarse and sore.

The taps in her house have been worn down, her washing machine frequently stops working, and her bathroom and kitchen have been stained a deep, bloody orange by the pollutants – iron, sulphur, even arsenic – that have seeped into her home’s water supply.

This is Appalachia – the heart of America’s coal country. It is home to some of the poorest and most isolated communities in the US and the legacy of mining, be it the abandoned processing plants or the scarred landscape, can be seen dotted alongside its vast highways.

Casey, who asked not to be identified by her real name, lives in a small, double-berth structure with a wooden porch in southern West Virginia. It’s a place where mobile phone reception is yet to reach. She pours a glass of water from her kitchen tap and lets it rest on a table. It has a strange smell and a sticky texture and within minutes begins to turn dark orange. A layer of black sediment soon sinks to the bottom of the glass.

“This is what we have to live with,” she says. “We don’t bathe in the water and we don’t cook with it. It stains our fingernails, our knuckles, and our clothes. It’s really, really difficult living like this.”

Casey and her husband Jack (not his real name), have two young children and drive for more than an hour to stock up on bottled water to drink and cook with. So who do they hold responsible?

“I’ve been here all my life, but when the surface [coal] mine came in that’s when the water started changing,” says Jack, who, despite being a miner himself, believes the industry is accountable for the family’s water problems. “I think if they’ve done wrong they should have to fix it.”

At the sprawling mine in the neighbouring valley, millions of pounds of explosives are being detonated on the mountaintops so that coal, buried deep below the surface, can be excavated.

This process is a type of surface mining known as mountaintop removal, and has drawn the ire not only of nearby residents but of environmental groups who say it devastates the landscape and pollutes the waterways.

One study estimates that an area the size of the state of Delaware has been flattened by this type of coal mining since it was first practised in the 1970s.

Another report by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimates that more than 2,000 miles of streams – a distance longer than the Mississippi river – have been buried by the excess rock and soil (known as overburden) that is dumped after the explosions.

And in a part of the world where many people rely on their own wells to get water, rather than a conventional, monitored, pipeline, any pollution from mining waste can have devastating consequences.

These private wells are essentially unregulated, so it is up to people like Casey and Jack to determine whether their water has been contaminated. But the complex nature of water pollution means many people are completely unaware of what’s entering their supply.

“When you dump a lot of overburden into the valley, and start covering up streams, you have water sources that end up travelling through the [waste] material,’ says Professor Michael McCawley, an environmental engineer who has spent time researching the health impacts of mountaintop removal.

“It’s kind of like dumping geological trash,” he explains. “It ends up increasing the concentration of acidic ions and metals [in the water], things like arsenic and nickel.” This pollution, according to his research, has taken a catastrophic toll on the health of those whose water supply lies in its path.

“This population is under assault from both water and air,” Professor McCawley says. “What we’re finding in the water is likely to cause inflammation in the body, which can set off a lot of other chronic diseases. “The big [problems] we have found are certainly cancers. Name a cancer and they’re seeing it here.”

When asked about cancer rates, Casey reels off a list of people living nearby who have been diagnosed in recent month. “Oh Lord everybody has been getting it,” she says. “It’s scary.”

Dr Wesley Lafferty, who is based in nearby Boone County, believes a number of health problems are being exacerbated by mining waste. “We get all kinds of symptoms,” he told Human Rights Watch last year. “Rashes, restrictive airway disease, dermatitis, generic skin disease. I definitely feel there is an environmental component to that.”

In a valley not far from Casey’s home, and sitting within earshot of the same mine that she says has caused her water contamination, Jason Walker is describing many of the same problems.

“My water was drinkable and clear before the mountaintop removal started,” he says. “But then it got worse. It smelt like rotten eggs and the colour of my sinks, faucets, all my laundry, turned orange.” He then had his water tested and was warned that it was so toxic that, if he washed his clothes in it, there was a risk that direct sunlight could set them on fire.

Jason now cooks with bottled water, but he has been collecting water from a nearby stream and treating it with swimming pool chemicals to supply his house. Last winter, after a spell of severe cold weather, he was forced to use an axe to cut through more than five inches of ice to access the stream water. But when the pipes he was using to pump it into his home froze solid he had to go without.

“I’m getting a new well drilled for $4,000 to keep myself from doing that again, even though I don’t know how good the water will be,” he says. “I took a loan out against our property to pay for it. It’s a huge gamble.

“My grandfather was a coal miner, my dad was a coal miner, but if the mines tear something up I think they should replace it. I want more regulations that actually help the little person and not the big person.”

In a telephone interview with the BBC, a spokesman for the company that owns the surface mine in Wyoming County said that it operated under strict state regulations and had a valid permit. “We view ourselves as pretty good neighbours and if somebody has an issue then we would address it,” said the spokesman for CM Energy, which took over the mine in 2017.

But when presented with the complaints of nearby residents, the spokesman declined to take responsibility and said the water contamination could have been caused by a number of different issues. “If we thought we were responsible then we would step up and try and do something about it,” the spokesman said. “If there’s something that our company can do to facilitate working with politicians and the local community then we would participate.”

The mine’s previous owner, Dynamic Energy, is facing a lawsuit from a number of residents – including Casey and Jack – who are seeking compensation for the costs of dealing with their water issues.

It won a similar lawsuit a few years ago, and Jason, who was part of that legal battle, said it left the entire community divided between those who supported the coal industry and those who wanted to fight back.

“There’s a lady down the street here who wouldn’t join the lawsuit,” he says. “She hasn’t spoken to me in almost two years because of it. They were scared it would mean losing jobs.”

Casey understands their concerns. “It’s how people make their living and support their families around here,” she says. “If you don’t work in the coal mines you either flip burgers or you have to move out of state and do something else.”

But her husband Jack says it wasn’t a difficult decision to join the latest legal action – even if he is a coal miner. “The only thing I really care about is getting fresh water the way it was when I was growing up around here,” he says. “I ain’t worried about the money. I just want clean water.”

Acid mine drainage is the primary water pollution source in WV

Update by Paul Ziemkiewicz, WV Water Research Institute, Morgantown, WV

Thanks for the invitation to update you on the recovery of rare earth elements from acid mine drainage. Our team at WVU and Virginia Tech identified acid mine drainage (AMD) from coal mines back in 2015 as a good feedstock for rare earth element (REE) recovery.

AMD is what happens when the pyrite in coal and overburden reacts with air to make sulfuric acid. That ‘free acid’ leaches REEs out of the rock and concentrates it at the discharge of a coal mine.

You do not need to open a new mine to collect REEs from AMD. Many abandoned mines generate AMD decades after closure. Second to untreated sewage, AMD is the biggest pollutant in Appalachian streams.

At the Water Research Institute, we and our WVU colleagues have been working on AMD since the late 1980s. We know its chemistry, treatment and have spent most of our time making it go away. Witness the water quality improvements in the Monongahela, Cheat and Tygart Rivers, plus lots of creeks.

We’ve developed a way to treat AMD while recovering REEs and, with USDOE/NETL funding, we are building a 1,000 gpm pilot plant with WV-DEP to demonstrate the process.

As an REE feedstock, AMD has the following advantages:
1. AMD has to be treated anyway and that costs money
2. Recovering REE would offset AMD treatment costs and that allows watershed cleanup dollars to go farther
3. It could be a source of revenue for watershed groups and others treating AMD
4. AMD based REE production has no radioactivity problems
5. It would also yield the critical mineral Cobalt
6. Permitting is simple, not the 8+ years typical for a new REE mine
7. In fact, most sites already have all the required permits
8. Compared to REE mines, AMD based REE are richer in the more critically important, heavy REEs
9. Extraction, using our patent pending process is economically attractive

I could go on, but this summarizes where we are now. Future steps involve proving our process at the new pilot plant, developing a collection system and supply chain feeding a regional REE concentrator.

Thank you, Paul F. Ziemkiewicz, Director, WV Water Research Institute

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See also: WVU awarded $5 million to continue rare earth project, build acid mine drainage treatment facility | WVU Today | October 1, 2019

Acid mine drainage is a major pollutant for West Virginia’s waters. The West Virginia Water Research Institute at WVU is looking at ways to extract rare earth elements from the sludge with the recent aid of $5 million from the U.S. Department of Energy. (WVU Photo/ Raymond Thompson, Jr.)

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WVU partners with Extreme Endeavors to mine rare earth elements from acid mine drainage

AMD research facility to be located near Mt. Storm in Grant County, WV

MONONGALIA COUNTY, WV – From decades of mining in West Virginia, over 40 percent of the states rivers are too polluted to be safely used for drinking water or to support aquatic life, according to Appalachian Mountain Advocates. Mike Masterman, owner of Extreme Endeavors, is partnering with WVU’s Water Research Institute to provide a solution that would benefit the environment and the economy.

“Throughout West Virginia there’s a lot of sights where abandoned coal mines, or even one’s that aren’t abandoned, where the coal leeches out an acid water,” he said.

“We designed a trailer for them (WVU researchers) so that they could go to any site they wanted to, throw a pump or two in the water, and do processing that then collects a pre-concentrated slurry that we can then take up to a laboratory setting and test it for rare earth elements,” Masterman said.

The trailer was built and designed to remove rare earth elements (REE) from acid mine drainage, which can then be used for profit. These elements can be found in products like smartphones, computers or even heads-up displays for the military. They are a desired natural resources around the world. The United States uses around 15,000 tons of these elements per year and it’s mostly imported from China.

Through this research, it will allow more production of REE’s to be provided from within the states. “The research is going to lead to a way where you can make a profit by protecting the environment,” Masterman said.

In order to protect the environment, the process of removing the rare elements would help prepare safe water for it’s reentry into the state’s streams and rivers. This is something Masterman believes needs improvement. His company has made its name in the drinking water field, and he has worked with several West Virginia public service districts on modernizing and digitizing their water management systems.

“Anytime that we can take this bad acid mine drainage, treat the water and then discharge it properly, that’s only going to help our environment,” Masterman said.

“We’re taking what the coal mines have been doing and we’re going to change it around to correct their environmental problem and we’re going to create another mining product within the state,” he said.

Within the next year, the construction for a research facility is going to begin in Mt. Storm at a new acid mine drainage treatment plant.

WVU CAC March 24 - 28

MFA exhibition focusing on Deckers Creek Watershed open March 24-28

MORGANTOWN, W.Va.– WVU Master of Fine Arts candidate Forrest Conroy will present his MFA thesis exhibition, focusing on the Deckers Creek Watershed, at the Creative Arts Center during March 24-28.

Titled “Watershed: A Call to Action,” the graphic design project will be on view in the Paul Mesaros Gallery. An opening reception for the exhibition will be held Thursday, March 27 at 6 p.m. All events are free and open to the public.

The goal of Conroy’s exhibition is to educate visitors and challenge people to see how their personal actions are connected to the health of their environment. The cornerstone project of his thesis work is CreekDog, a web application that allows citizens to report and track serious pollution issues throughout the Deckers Creek Watershed.

Industries that used the creek as a source of water power included a forge and iron furnace, grist mills, saw mills, and a pottery and a paper mill. Rapid industrialization in the first half of the 20th century took a heavy toll on the once-pristine creek, as water quality declined and aquatic life diminished. Recreational fishing and boating on the creek eventually ceased after acid mine runoff and open sewage fouled the water.

Friends of Deckers Creek (FODC), a community non-profit watershed association, organized in 1995 to start clean-ups of illegal dumps and to monitor water quality. In 1998, the state Department of Environmental Protection and federal Natural Resources Conservation Service committed $10 million to clean up acid mine drainage in the Deckers Creek Watershed, an effort that continues to be guided by FODC.

Conroy’s project was developed in partnership with Friends of Deckers Creek and is based on their Watershed Bill of Rights Program that calls citizens to take action. CreekDog takes this one step further by providing a tool that facilitates action between citizens and the public agencies responsible for addressing these issues.

“It is important that we find ways to educate and empower citizens to take an active role in protecting their environment and bettering their communities,” Conroy said. “The story of Deckers Creek is one of both immense beauty and complex environmental issues. People want to help and do the right thing. Many people either don’t know there’s a problem, or, if they do, don’t know how to solve it—but everyone plays a part. I hope that this exhibition helps to create an opportunity for people to make a difference.”

The CreekDog project is being funded, in part, by a grant from the Appalachian stewardship foundation. The Mesaros Galleries are open Monday through Saturday, from noon to 9:30 p.m. For more information on the event, contact Robert Bridges, curator of the Mesaros Galleries at 304-293-2312.