Western Mines Continue Poisoning Water Supplies

By: Duane Craig
Colorado’s watershed continues being poisoned by the state’s mining legacy, according to this article. Abandoned mines so far have impaired 1,300 miles of the state’s streams and the headwaters of 40 percent of the Western rivers.
The toxic sludge flowing from just one of the more notoriously contaminating mines, the Penn Mine, released “186 pounds of cadmium, 4,496 pounds of copper, 21,529 pounds of manganese, 21 pounds of lead and 39,896 pounds of zinc in a single year.” That contamination left two waterways largely devoid of aquatic life. The solutions are complex and challenging, and whatever ones are chosen it will still be decades before the natural world and water supplies can begin to recover. Read the entire, in-depth story at the link above.