Colorado generates large amounts of clean, green electricity using its vast reserves of stored solar energy.
Disrupting the Borg is expensive and time consuming!
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Colorado generates large amounts of clean, green electricity using its vast reserves of stored solar energy.
Thats all good.
All we need now is a campaign for stricter dust level controls and you we claim that it’s safe too
http://www.hcn.org/blogs/goat/images-2/CDPHE_CWPhospitalizations_20012011.jpg
From
http://www.hcn.org/blogs/goat/coal-dust-rule-challenged-by-mining-companies-black-lung-more-prevalent-in-miners
Gees, downward basically trend all the way.
Good to know this preventable disease can be controlled with proper OHAS, hey ! 🙂
You are a bit behind the times on that one Chris,
WSJ, April 23, 2014
http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/NA-CA913_COALDU_G_20140423184204.jpg
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) agency was established the under the Occupational Safety and Health Act signed into law on December 29, 1970. It has put a big dent in the problem.
Another bot of technology besides testing devices and masks:
MSHA (Mine Safety and Health Administration)
The rule takes effect August 1, 2014, with some components phased in over the following two years.
Zinkan is providing and developing innovative mining chemicals for coal mine dust control
Their product line:
http://www.zinkan.com/industries/coal/
ARUGH, I really wish we could edit. I am fighting a very slow connection that constantly drops service so my editing is not doing well. Sorry guys.
How are the figures which i produced and which are directly comparable to the ones which you produced ‘behind the times’, Gail
They’re the same sort of numbers
You seem to be discrediting my figures, when they’re from the same sources as yours.. Why ?
A known reason for the reduction in the number of black lung diagnosis
No I am not discrediting your figures Chris.
I am saying those figures were recognized and addressed by new mining standards and new technology here in the USA.
No figures on the number of deaths, or diseases etc related to the mining of the rare earth in China. It is only since wind turdines came on the scene that the real mess has been made. Each turdine magnet uses large amounts rare earths, up to a several tons of the stuff. Comparing to the use in iPhones etc is very stupid.
Also, magnets in coal powered power stations are not the same material, they don’t need to be a light as possible vs magnetic flux, so they don’t have to include the rare earths with their associated massive pollution.
Are we comparing apples and oranges here?
The Colorado picture is showing open pit mines, while the mines in Appalachia are closed, and obviously more hazardous in many ways
I have always learned that the quality of coal is greater in Appalachia and that is why mining there continues. But what do I know?
On the off chance that a coal worker is reading this, don’t forget your benefits….if you don’t care about you then nobody else will
http://www.dol.gov/owcp/dcmwc/regs/compliance/blbene.htm
What good are benefits if your company is put out of business?
As the benefits only go to guys who can no longer work what difference does it make ?
Then you should use past tense.
As in “On the off chance that a former coal worker is reading this …”
I would rather have them use the technology available to PREVENT the disease in the first place!
From 2011 WSJ:
……
O/T
I used to do the plant safety testing for one of the chemical companies I worked for in the 1970s. The union steward was barking up the wrong tree safety-wise. I ran into him at the laundry-mat the week before I was leaving to take another job. I tipped him off about where he could find all my copies of the reports sent to management that got marked confidential as well as the 1970s copy of the book:
http://www.amazon.com/Comprehensive-Hazardous-Properties-Chemical-Substances/dp/0471714585
A fellow chemist/caver still working at the company later reported the company was forced to clean up its act.
https://media2.stickersmalin.com/produit/100/stickers-devil-smile-R1-143760-2.png
http://moonbattery.com/graphics/liberalism.jpg
A well informed union steward can do wonders for the people working at a company if he is realistic and knowledgable. The guy above is not the only union steward I sat down and educated off company property. Often their understanding of economics as well as chemistry is dismal and the state and national organizations are not about to educate them.
Now that education is a lot easier to obtain thanks to the internet.
I think only a madman would think it woasn’t worth improving conditions.
Which is exactly why we have to wonder why Obama drags his feet on the bill which will half the safe level for coal dust in mines…pressure from mine owners regarding the costs involved perhaps ?
in the meantime, the miners still need paying their due compensation so spending the money on something else would be a bit mean.
Currently there’s a bit over 16,000 black lung benefits claimants per month. Payments vary from $638 for a single miner, to about $950 with one depedent and upto $1276 per month with 3 or more depednents
If the average payment were $1000 that’s $16million a month which the mines are having to pay and add on to the cost of coal.
Here’s the thing…I bet Obama is reluctant to lower the safe limit because the cost will force the mine owners to have to lose much more………In my view the mine owners should be paid a subsidy to install the new ventilation equipment because it is the government which sets the limit.
Chris the new ruling went into effect August 2014. That is what I keep trying to tell you.
US Department of Labor
Mine Safety and Health Administration – MSHA
Final rule issued to better protect coal miners’ health
Obama has nothing to do with it since it is a REGULATION and not a law. In the USA a new reg gets written and then is placed in the FEDERAL REGISTER:
Once published as a proposed rule the public may comment for a set period of time:
At the end of the comment period the federal agency reads the comments and may rewrite, abandon or publish the proposed rule as a final rule. (Rules and Regs are the same thing)
This process has been carried out and the final rule/regulation published. It now has the same weight in a court of law as a law passed by Congress and signed by the President.
I do not like the system but that is the system in the USA. It has already been challenged in the Supreme Court and declared constitutional so we are stuck with bureaucrats writing laws.
BTW, Gail glad to see you are back.
Have you been on vacation?
open pit mining (as in pic) not as susceptible to the issues miners have.
cabs are hepa protected often.
Another thread hijacked by Chris Baron.
He’s a troll, pure and simple, out to distract from the issues we discuss here. He does it on purpose and probably spends his time bragging to his buddies about all of the attention he gets.
I wouldn’t even spend time arguing with his assertions.
His time here will pass. Remember the Fish?
Now, back to the thread…
I’m curious how “clean” the coal really is. “Clean Coal”, as in how we that have spent time in the environmental and energy fields and know what we’re talking about understand it.
Is the coal in that area low in sulfur? I know that it’s scrubbed out of the exhaust gases (I used to work on environmental permits for SO2 scrubbers), but I’m interested in the comparative levels of sulfur for the coal out there.
Just from an academic point of view. I know the SO2 emissions are regulated and what comes out of the stacks is clean.
Right on cue.. Wind Turbine Permits halted in Denmark.
http://notrickszone.com/2015/04/21/beleaguered-industry-wind-parks-coming-under-fire-due-to-health-impacts-from-infrasound-danish-permitting-halts/#sthash.w8HwAthq.dpbs
Hopefully this issue will no longer be swept under the carpet.
The Borg of Aalborg …
http://waubrafoundation.org.au/2014/professor-henrik-moller-sacked-by-dean-faculty-engineering-from-aalborg-university
http://acoustics.aau.dk/staff/hm.html
———-
He was an electrical engineer. What do they know about climate change?
I went into an underground U mine in Colorado years ago. Respirators were required, especially on the mining face (not word play, that’s what the active work area is called). The union steward would come by, the miners had their masks on. The health rep from the company did the same. Masks on. They left, the miners pulled their masks down.
I am not surprised. People still smoke. A bit of education, a trip to a hospital to see the results of idiotic behavior and for coal miners literally passing around a healthy lung and a black lung.
Our Bio teacher did that in high school and it sure convinced me not to smoke. The feel of that gritty black lung really drove how the reason not to smoke. I am the only non-smoker in my family.
At some point though people have to be responsible for their own behavior.
grumble
drove how the reason = drove home the reason
My smoking parents did all they could to make sure my brother and I never smoked. They succeeded. God bless them.