In Tainted Earth, Marianne Sullivan examines the impact of non-ferrous smelting pollution in three US communities, investigating how the smelting industry successfully delayed pollution control measures for nearly a century. Smelting, the process of extracting metals from ore, played an important (and lucrative) role in US manufacturing. The process releases impurities such as lead and arsenic,...

Most of the dust generated from the copper smelting process in Chili has been stored after the stabilization by hydrometallurgical process because it contains high concentration of arsenic. However, in recent years, the generation of dust has increased because of degrading the quality of concentrate. In addition, the environmental regulations become stricter. On the other hand, valuable metals ...

OBJECTIVE Natural disasters exacerbate risks of hazardous environmental exposures and adverse health consequences. The present study determined the proportion of previously identified lead industrial sites in urban locations that are at high risk for dispersal of toxic chemicals by natural disasters. METHODS Geographic analysis from publicly available data identified former lead smelting plan...

An important aspect of non-ferrous metal production is the separation process known as smelting, in which the concentrated ore is melted and separated into two components of different densities: the slag and the matte. The smelting process is carried out through high-power heating in electric arc furnaces. In order to maintain a constant desired matte production rate and constant matte and slag...

The development of the mercury (Hg) amalgamation process in the mid-sixteenth century triggered the onset of large-scale Hg mining in both the Old and New Worlds. However, ancient Hg emissions associated with amalgamation and earlier mining efforts remain poorly constrained. Using a geochemical time-series generated from lake sediments near Cerro Rico de Potosí, once the world's largest silver ...

BACKGROUND Children's exposure to lead poses a significant risk for neurobehavioral consequences. Existing studies documented lead contamination in residential soil in mining and smelting communities in Armenia. This study aimed to assess blood lead levels (BLL) in children living in three communities in Armenia adjacent to metal mining and smelting industries, and related risk factors. METHO...

The importance of metallurgy for social and economic development is indisputable. Although copper (Cu) was essential for the wealth of pre- and post-colonial societies in the Andes, the onset of extensive Cu metallurgy in South America is still debated. Comprehensive archaeological findings point to first sophisticated Cu metallurgy during the Moche culture ~200-800 AD, whereas peat-bog records...

Types of land disposed residuals from selected metal smelting and refining industries are described, as are the origin and disposition of land disposed residuals from the primary copper industry as an example. Quantities of land-disposed or stored residuals, including slags, sludges, and dusts, are given per unit of metal production for most primary and secondary metal smelting and refining ind...

The Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) is a fast, non-contact, no sample preparation analytic technology; it is very suitable for on-line analysis of alloy composition. In the copper smelting industry, analysis and control of the copper alloy concentration affect the quality of the products greatly, so LIBS is an efficient quantitative analysis technology in the copper smelting industr...

BACKGROUND In Vietnam, environmental pollution caused by small-scale domestic smelting of automobile batteries into lead ingot is a growing concern. The village of Nghia Lo is a smelting craft village located roughly 25 km southeast of Hanoi in the Red River Delta. Despite the concern of toxic metal exposure in the village, biomonitoring among susceptible populations, such as children, has not ...