Preview

The Cause and Effects of Acid Mine Drainage

Better Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1714 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
The Cause and Effects of Acid Mine Drainage
The Cause and Effects of Acid Mine Drainage

INTRODUCTION

Imagine going fishing on a cool Autumn day, the trees are all different shades of orange, brown and red and the birds are singing their beautiful songs, but their is a serious problem because when you arrive at the river all plant and animal life are gone. This is by no means a recent phenomenon. This is due to the effects of acid rock drainage (ARD). This is a problem that has been occurring since ancient times, but it was not until the 1800's when fast growing industrialization and heavy mining that it caught a lot of attention. Acid rock drainage is the term used to describe leachate, seepage, or drainage that has been affected by the natural oxidation of sulfur minerals contained in rock which is exposed to air and water. The major components of
ARD formation are reactive sulfide minerals, oxygen, and water. Biological activity and reactions is what is responsible for the production of ARD. These reactions make low pH water that has the ability to mobilize heavy metals contained in geological materials with which it comes in contact. "ARD causes a devastating impact on the quality of the ground or surface water it discharges to. (Ellison & Hutchison)"

ACID MINE DRAINAGE

Within the mining process there are several sources that cause ARD. No matter what activities occur, ARD usually occurs when certain conditions are met. These conditions are the factors that limit or accelerate the release of ARD.
The initial release of ARD can occur anywhere from a few months to many decades after the sulfide containing material is disturbed or deposited. ARD has been associated with mines since mining began. When ARD occurs due to the effects of mining it is called acid mine drainage, or AMD. The coal mining industry here in the eastern United States has been associated with a major source of AMD for decades. When water comes in contact with pyrite in coal and the rock surrounding it, chemical

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    SCI 207 Week 4 Lab

    • 1009 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Answer = Acid mine drainage (AMD) is one of the more serious environmental problems in the mining industry. AMD is the major pollutant of surface waters in the Mid-Atlantic Region of the United States (US EPA, 2006). The formation of AMD is a very complex chemical and microbial process, and usually occurs where deep excavations, such as those associated with coal mining, expose unweathered pyritic materials. Water contaminated by AMD on permitted sites where…

    • 1009 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    are starting to disappear. To solve this, we must emit less carbon dioxide into the…

    • 709 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Quiz Week 1

    • 435 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Eco System damage- 60% of the worlds ecosystem services have been degraded and species extinctions are running between 100 and 1000 times…

    • 435 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Vegucated

    • 1590 Words
    • 6 Pages

    often overflow into nearby fields or ponds. Another example of how bad it is for the Earth is…

    • 1590 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Due to fossil fuels and greenhouse gases emitted by everyday human activity, earth is gradually warming up, which could mean the end of a number of different species. "Temperatures forecasted over the next century are within the range of the warmest greenhouse phases that are associated with mass extinction events identified in the fossil record" (Jenkins, 2007).…

    • 772 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    -Mass extinction: a crisis that affects life right across the planet from the deepest oceans to the highest mountains…

    • 5577 Words
    • 19 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    While one tends to have the general idea as to what’s happening around the world, it isn’t until someone comes around and tells you exactly what’s going on that you become truly aware. This thought was the first to cross my mind while I was reading The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert. Before getting into the details of this book review, I would like to preface it by saying that before beginning this class I had an idea of what was happening around the globe. I was not so uninformed as to say that I didn’t know the climate was changing and species were gradually disappearing, but rather I was unaware as to just how quickly this was taking place. I can say that in the back of my mind there has…

    • 1214 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    We should be concern about the mass extinctions of organisms because without them, we will not have any support for food supplies and the environment. Especially, the functioning of the ecosystem. However, I believe that this catastrophe has been going on for years, however some people have no idea where this will lead us to. We should do something about this and that carries with responsibility. We have the option to stop and act upon the current rate of extinction with measures that will prevent habitat loss, and with regulations and rules that will provide species the kind of safety net that humans have. Most importantly, we must adapt to change.…

    • 290 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Cask of Amontillado

    • 1550 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Edgar Allen Poe was a master of the horror genre and The Cask of Amontillado was no exception. This was the story of what may have been a perfect crime. Narrating events that took place fifty years before, Montresor, a wealthy Frenchman, began the tale by explaining that Fortunato, a fellow wine connoisseur, after a series of unknown events insulted him. Although Montresor never states what this insult was, he was angry enough about it to premeditate Fortunato’s murder. Montresor’s true goal lay not only in revenge, but also in escaping punishment for the crime. The central idea of The Cask of Amontillado is about freedom: with freedom to make choices, some people choose revenge and will go through whatever means necessary to exact it.…

    • 1550 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Unless you live under a rock, you will have noticed what’s happening around the human race due to global warming and climate modification. It is not only affecting us humans, it is also affecting our vegetation, our animals, and our oceans. I recently watched a video by National Geographic about the precious coral reefs in the Florida Keys and it talked about how the coral reefs cannot keep up with the rising sea level, so eventually they will all just die (“Fighting to Save Coral in the Florida Keys”). Additionally this will lead to habitat loss and then species dying off. If this scenario belonged to one area it would be tragic but climate change is disrupting habitats and killing off dependent mintage humanity worldwide.…

    • 1989 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson predicts that our present course will lead to the extinction of half of all plant and animal species by 2100. Seven in ten biologists believe that mass extinction poses a colossal threat to human existence, a more serious environmental problem than even its contributor, global warming; and that the dangers of mass extinction are traumatically underestimated by almost everyone outside science.…

    • 361 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    The Effects of Coal on the Wetlands 1 The Effects of Coal on the Wetlands Summary Coal is one of the most used sources of energy in the world. Big energy corporations like it because it is very cheap and abundant. On top of being cheap and abundant coal is very easy to extract as it does not need much heavy equipment like drills. Although coal may sound good it is not.…

    • 1300 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    When I started writing this forum reply I was focused only on the extinction rates of animals. While looking for resources I found articles talking about extinction rates of insects and plants throughout the world and how that will affect us as well. “We are confronting an episode of species extinction greater than anything the world has experienced for the past 65 million years. Of all the global problems that confront us, this is the one that is moving the most rapidly and the one that will have the most serious consequences. And, unlike other global ecological problems, it is completely irreversible” (Raven, as cited, McCarthy, 1997). It wasn’t that I wasn’t aware…

    • 486 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The toxic gases released are responsible for acid rain and greenhouse effects in the environment. It is an undeniable fact that the unregulated or irresponsible surface mining of coal may cause soil erosion, damage from rolling stones, land slides, and stream pollution, increases the likelihood of floods, reduces the value of land for agricultural purposes, can be detrimental to the conservation of soil, and may create hazards to life and property’.…

    • 1669 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Garbage in Goa

    • 408 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Mining has also created a degraded environment and is also a matter of concern. Damage to the environment is mainly done by the reject dumps, pumping out of muddy waters from the working pits including those where the mining operations have gone below the water table, and slimes from the beneficiation plant. The damage is more evidenced during monsoon where the rain water carries the washed out material from the waste dumps to the adjoining low-lying agricultural fields and water streams. It is stated that the slimes and silts, which enter the agricultural field are of such character that they get hardened on drying. The washed out material from the dumps and the flow of slimes from the…

    • 408 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays