For half a century, nearly 30 million tons of red mud was dumped in the pit of Cassidaigne, now in the heart of the national park of the Calanques
The Alteo Gardanne plant, near Aix-en-Provence, deals aluminum ore – bauxite. To extract thereof alumina which aluminum metal is pulled, the manufacturer uses the industrial process “Bayer” very greedy for water and energy, which comprises dissolving the ore in caustic soda, and in -is produced huge amounts of effluents tinted red by iron oxides. The plant disposes of these residues as it can, where it is allowed and where it costs the least expensive, namely in the sea!
The red mud waste affects the entire marine life
The December 29, 2015, the prefect of the PACA region authorized the company Alteo to keep on its dirty operations for six more years in the Big Blue. The real danger lies in the red mud caustic soda and aluminum residues that contains the mixture, but especially in its content “exceeding regulatory limits” in well over lethal substances: arsenic, heavy metals (lead, mercury , chromium, titanium, cadmium, nickel …) and radioactive elements (isotopes of uranium, thorium, etc.). These wastes affect all marine life – phytoplankton and animal, the cohort of invertebrates (molluscs, crustaceans, echinoderms…), small and large fish, and to mammals: dolphins, sperm whales, whales… Chemical pollutants of this type are often barely detectable in the surrounding water, but they reconcentrent in the flesh of living organisms, from one floor to another in the food pyramid. Such tuna or dolphin, the man who eats fish or seafood is at the worst place in the system, and enjoyed it both via food and medicine!
