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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

#191

Post by lazide »

nradov wrote: post #188
jandrewrogers wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Arsenic at 0.0025 mg/L That is well below the noise floor. Like the similarly toxic selenium, arsenic is an essential micronutrient in animal biology. It is possible to be deficient in arsenic, though rare in practice. Natural background levels are far higher in many locales with no adverse effects. I often see trace quantities of arsenic trotted out by the popular media for scaremongering purposes. Examples like t…

Could you expand on what makes arsenic an essential micronutrient? What are the clinical signs and symptoms of severe arsenic deficiency? I've never heard of this before.

It has no known physiological role in humans. Selenium has similar stuff going on. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arsenic_biochemistry]

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

#192

Post by AnimalMuppet »

selectodude wrote: post #189
nradov wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you expand on what makes arsenic an essential micronutrient? What are the clinical signs and symptoms of severe arsenic deficiency? I've never heard of this before.

It’s not hard to figure this stuff out yourself.

Perhaps not. At the same time, when a person makes a claim, and several (or several hundred) people read it, it seems more efficient to ask the person who made the claim to supply the documentation, rather than making the several (hundred) people all do the looking. The looking does not have to be hard for this to be true.

Also, just in general debate terms, the one who makes a claim is the one who has the burden of substantiating it.

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

#193

Post by lazide »

SoftTalker wrote: post #101
landl0rd wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really; strontium is quite common in the crust. In the oceans it occurs in the single-digit mg/L. This isn't a meaningful datapoint. The entire article doesn't show particularly concerning findings and the protests read more like nimbyism than environmental concern. Industrial processes have some non-zero level of impact and complaining when someone runs one that's not very polluting at all is letting the perfect…

Yes just searched it and found: While natural strontium (which is mostly the isotope strontium-88) is stable, the synthetic strontium-90 is radioactive and is one of the most dangerous components of nuclear fallout, as strontium is absorbed by the body in a similar manner to calcium. Natural stable strontium is not hazardous to health at low levels. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strontium I guess I didn't realize tha…

Cesium too. Makes all sorts of cool fireworks happen.

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

#194

Post by lazide »

numpad0 wrote: post #63
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…

yaaaay hexavalent chromium and arsenic, the classics. Are they melting or plating something? Or is it just ores being ores?

Based on other comments, the levels are well below drinking water in the area - and probably within safe drinking water limits.

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

#195

Post by cyberax »

bluGill wrote: post #116
cyberax wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arsenic and lead occur naturally through the food chain. If the levels of discharge are not significantly above the normal levels (and they aren't) then it's harmless.

They are still not harmless. They are normal. However if they are at all above natural (that is your input levels) you should treat and remove them. It is not unusual for the output of a sewage treatment plant to be cleaner water than what goes into your drinking water system.

From a quick lookaround, it looks like a lot of water sources in the area have similar natural levels of arsenic. I could not find chromium content information, and it's plausible that it can be leached from stainless steel.

These are pretty much the only two concerning contaminants. Everything else in the report is just fear-mongering, like the BS about manganese.

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

#196

Post by AngryData »

Waterluvian wrote: post #11
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…

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

Yeah but the volume of water you can release is still limited so does still reduce pollutants if you are running up against that limit.

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

#197

Post by lazide »

xg15 wrote: post #184
foxglacier wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you understand that people pee lithium into their toilets too. But you didn't just read an article riling you up to being mad at the municipal sewage industry so you aren't mad at it at the moment.

Yes, and you shouldn't dump untreated municipal wastewater into rivers either? That's what we have treatment plants for. I don't get what that has to do with anything.

The treatment plants discharge water with waaay higher levels of exactly what everyone is complaining about here.

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

#198

Post by Sabinus »

nutjob2 wrote: post #42

There is a reason China does so well refining metals like lithium and rare earths: it's difficult, resource intensive and polluting. They have about a 80% global share in lithium processing. That doesn't matter under a communist dictatorship, but in more civilized countries people don't want it in their backyard.

Do you want to be reliant on a communist dictatorship for multiple critical inputs to your economy?

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

#199

Post by dwattttt »

SecretDreams wrote: post #186
something765478 wrote: post #91

> The permit, a Texas Pollutant Discharge Elimination System authorization known as TPDES, allowed up to 231,000 gallons of treated wastewater per day to be discharged into an unnamed ditch that flows into Petronila Creek and from there into Baffin Bay, a longtime South Texas saltwater fishing destination. Ok, so sounds like Tesla got the necessary legal provisions. > What it did not do, explicitly, was grant Tesla t…

> Lithium and vanadium at concentrations Lazarte’s letter described as abnormally high relative to rainwater or normal groundwater. > 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. > Strontium at 1.17…

Per ggreer's comment [0], there are other potential sources nearby.

It's pretty annoying all told. It invalidates the results; it takes them from "this is clear evidence of a breach" into "maybe it's in breach. Or maybe someone else is. Or maybe both are within their respective limits"

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48199824

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

#200

Post by nradov »

selectodude wrote: post #189
nradov wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you expand on what makes arsenic an essential micronutrient? What are the clinical signs and symptoms of severe arsenic deficiency? I've never heard of this before.

It’s not hard to figure this stuff out yourself.

It is hard. I did some searches before commenting and couldn't find anything about arsenic deficiency. I don't know much about arsenic biochemistry so could you kindly point us to a good source?
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