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Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

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Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#71

Post by goosejuice »

fuzzy2 wrote: post #38
dvt wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So, it's fine as long as it's legal, then? > Love that way of thinking. I mean.. yeah, kinda'? We live in a society made up of laws, that's kind of the premise. So if we don't think something is fine, we can make it illegal (and we often do). It's a pretty good way of thinking methinks, what's your alternative?

Dunno, maybe strive to release no pollutants at all? Then we wouldn't need all the pesky big government overreach.

Um, I'm pretty sure we can all get behind corps striving for the ideal. Fines align incentives.

Are you actually suggesting that we rely on the good will of a for profit corp? When has that ever worked?

Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#72

Post by MisterTea »

porphyra wrote: post #4

Obviously, discharging "dark and murky" polluted water is bad. But some of the figures from the lab report don't seem that terrible: * Hexavalent chromium at 0.0104 milligrams per liter, just above the lab’s reporting limit of 0.01 mg/L. Hexavalent chromium is classified as a known human carcinogen by the US National Toxicology Program. It is the substance the Erin Brockovich case was built around. * Arsenic at 0.002…

My guess is the hexavalent chromium is leeched from plated metals in processing equipment. Very common plating substance and was more common before restrictions were put in place.

Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#73

Post by SoftTalker »

porphyra wrote: post #4

Obviously, discharging "dark and murky" polluted water is bad. But some of the figures from the lab report don't seem that terrible: * Hexavalent chromium at 0.0104 milligrams per liter, just above the lab’s reporting limit of 0.01 mg/L. Hexavalent chromium is classified as a known human carcinogen by the US National Toxicology Program. It is the substance the Erin Brockovich case was built around. * Arsenic at 0.002…

What about:

Strontium at 1.17 mg/L

That seems like a misprint? Strontium is a fission byproduct. And that seems like a high amount if that's milligrams per liter.

Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#74

Post by bayindirh »

baggy_trough wrote: post #58
fuzzy2 wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dunno, maybe strive to release no pollutants at all? Then we wouldn't need all the pesky big government overreach.

To exist is to pollute.

But you can pollute sustainably. e.g.: Composting, biodegradable materials, etc.

or unsustainably: e.g.: PFAS. For bonus points you can do internal research and hide the reports detailing the effects accurately.

Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#75

Post by bayindirh »

xiaoyu2006 wrote: post #68
bayindirh wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, it's fine as long as it's legal, then? How about when it enters the food chain and starts to accumulate? Will the elements say that "we're under legal limits, and accumulate slowly, so we will act nice and don't poison the organism we're in?" Love that way of thinking.

> we're under legal limits That's the definition of law. As long as it is legal it won't be charged.

What if the law is formulated to be convenient for corporations and not to protect the public and/or the environment?

Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#76

Post by xg15 »

> What [the wastewater discharge permit] did not do, explicitly, was grant Tesla the right to use public or private property for wastewater conveyance. The drainage district that manages the ditch the pipe was discharging into was never notified that the permit existed.

I find it kinda worrying that so much of the legal weight of this case doesn't seem to be about the untreated wastewater discharge at all but only about the detail that they used a county-owned ditch to do so.

So if Tesla had dug their own ditch or built the pipe all the way to Petronila Creek, the discharge would have been no problem?

(Well, that's not completely true as the additional pollutants aren't covered by the permit either - but without the ditch issue, probably no one would have commissioned an analysis of the water?)

Re: Tesla's lithium refinery discharges 231,000 gallons of polluted wastewater a day

#78

Post by SoftTalker »

MisterTea wrote: post #57
Waterluvian wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I wanted to fall under that reporting limit, can I just dilute my wastewater a bit more?

That is how car manufacturers worked around the old tail pipe emission laws. They added air pumps plumbed to the exhaust manifold(s) to increase the exhaust mass diluting the stream enough to pass emissions tests. Problem solved!

Is that what a "smog pump" is (was)? LOL. I had heard the term but never knew what it was.

Along the same lines then as other emissions equipment that reduced fuel economy but achieved the ppm criteria in the exhaust. Yes, let's address pollution by burning more fuel.

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