Welcome to Environmental Pollution Guide
Russias Environmental Problems Pollution Article
. For a permanent link to this article, or to bookmark it for further reading, click here.
Industrial Pollution And Environmental Degradation Threaten Historic Colorado Town
from:Leadville, Colorado is one of the jewels of American city-building. If Denver is the mile-high city, Leadville is the Two-Mile High City, rising 10,152 feet above sea level--the highest city elevation in the United States. A product of the gold and silver rushes of the late nineteenth century, Leadville was famous for its quick mineral strikes and for some of its well-known residents and visitors, among them OK Corral gunfighter Doc Holliday and playwright and self-proclaimed genius Oscar Wilde. Wilde made Leadville infamous with his comments about "the only rational method of art criticism" he'd ever seen, posted above a piano in a Leadville saloon: "Please don't shoot the piano player; he is doing his best." Even after the end of the Leadville silver boom in 1893, Leadville remained a popular leave destination for soldiers stationed nearby, as well as a well-populated suburb for former mining families and a tourist destination for anyone interested in one of the most colorful chapters of America's past.
Now all of that is threatened by industrial pollution and environmental degradation. The miners of Leadville dug deeply into the earth and brought out its mineral riches. In the process, they had to drain off water poisoned by mining equipment and toxic minerals loosed from the earth. The government built a drainage pipe in the 1940s to leach this water into the Arkansas River, where it would be carried to the sea. Classic example of industrial pollution and environmental degradation, and one for which the town of Leadville may have paid--with its life.
The drainage tunnel, long unmaintained with the late-1980s closure of the Leadville mines, collapsed at some point in the early 1990s. The toxic water, instead of draining off "safely" into the ocean, has instead been backing up in the ruined drainage tunnel ever since.
As of 2008, the tunnel is filled with one billion gallons of poisonous water. At any moment, heavy snows, shifts in the earth, or literally any number of disturbances could cause the tunnel to crack. When that happens--not if, but when that happens--Leadville and its 2,000+ residents will be directly in the path of the toxic flow, the tragic inheritors of industrial pollution and environmental degradation.
In February of 2008, the town authorities declared a state of emergency. Children are made to practice evacuation drills. The federal government can do nothing. It's reminiscent of the "duck and cover" atomic-bomb culture of the 1950s. Only in this case, there is no enemy army aiming missiles at us. There's no easily-blamed villain--beyond industrial pollution and environmental degradation, that same industrial pollution and environmental degradation than in a sick twist of fate made Leadville famous to begin with. In the words of Pogo Possum: the town of Leadville has met the enemy, and he is us.
Russias Environmental Problems Pollution Specific links
Russias Environmental Problems Pollution News
Russia, US observe 40th anniversary of joint environmental activities - FireEngineering.com
Russia, US observe 40th anniversary of joint environmental activities FireEngineering.com On May 23 Russia and the United States are celebrating the 40th anniversary of joint activities in the field of environmental protection, the US embassy in Moscow declared. Russian and US scientists will get together at the embassy on Wednesday to ... |
Toxic tsunami debris will flood Alaska shores - Anchorage Daily News
Toxic tsunami debris will flood Alaska shores Anchorage Daily News What we see unfolding is a slow-motion environmental disaster that will far exceed any past pollution event ever to hit the west coast of North American, including the Exxon Valdez and Santa Barbara oil spills. This is not exaggeration or hyperbole. |
India warns EU over airline carbon tax - Financial Times
India warns EU over airline carbon tax Financial Times Last week Indian and Chinese airlines refused to share data with the EU on how much carbon they had emitted in 2011 – the most serious revolt against Brussels' scheme to charge carriers for their pollution. The airlines – two from India and eight from ... |
European Fracking Bans Open Market for U.S. Gas Exports - Bloomberg
 Bloomberg | European Fracking Bans Open Market for U.S. Gas Exports Bloomberg Bulgaria and France -- home of the continent's largest estimated reserve -- outlawed it over environmental concerns. Some other countries are poised to impose moratoriums on the process, in which water, sand and chemicals are pumped underground to free ... |
The G8 Summit: Hype or Helpful? - Patch.com
The G8 Summit: Hype or Helpful? Patch.com According to chicagog8.com, in the early 1970s, several leading world economic countries would meet at the White House to discuss a number of different issues including pollution and conservation. By 1975, after France and Germany called for a more ... |