Archive for the ‘flue gas desulfurization’ Category
John Friedman: Climate Change: Good for Business?
From an article about business innovation and climate change:
Synthetic gypsum has been used to make wallboard in the United States for more than 20 years. Electric power plants that burn coal are required to have scrubbers that trap emissions. The result is a very pure synthetic gypsum that is being used to create wallboard. Since 2000, enough gypsum to finish the interior of more than 7 million American homes has come from this waste product.The future belongs to the innovators and the clever and the bold.
Gypsum Association Commissions Extensive Life Cycle Assessment Study – Times Union
In support of the study, primary life cycle inventory (LCI) data were collected for three major gate-to-gate processes in the production of gypsum wallboard (natural or crude gypsum ore extraction, gypsum paper manufacture, and gypsum wallboard production) for the reference year 2010. The manufacturing plant study sample included all Gypsum Association member companies and represented about 30% of all gypsum wallboard produced in the USA. To ensure representativeness, the manufacturing plant study also considered the scale of operations including a mix of small, medium and large facilities, their geographical location in each US census region and their source of gypsum (adjacent quarry, mine, or imported gypsum ore) as well as their use of flue gas desulphurization (FGD) gypsum.
Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/business/press-releases/article/Gypsum-Association-Commissions-Athena-Institute-3335326.php#ixzz1maHsKygW
American-Made Drywall Emerges as Potential Danger – ProPublica
Ninety-seven homeowners in four states have joined lawsuits against U.S. drywall manufacturers in the past year, claiming that their drywall is releasing enough sulfur gas to corrode wiring and appliances and cause headaches, nosebleeds, labored breathing and irritated eyes—complaints that until now have been mostly associated with Chinese drywall. Many families have abandoned their homes, fearing long-term health problems. Some are facing foreclosure, or even bankruptcy.
via American-Made Drywall Emerges as Potential Danger – ProPublica.
Cleaning up corrosive drywall and polluted air
Scam warning
Today US senators from the states most affected by the corrosive drywall situation (Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Virginia) urged the Federal Trade Commission to take steps to protect homeowners from opportunists offering false “cures” for their problems. In a letter to the FTC they said:
…as the issue has unfolded and the problem has become more widely publicized, more and more companies and individuals have come forward to announce and advertise “solutions” for homeowners. These “solutions” are generally in the form of testing procedures to identify Chinese drywall or remediation protocols that claim to completely remove the product from homes. Some companies have even advertised that they are part of a national certification program — despite the fact that the Federal government has yet to fully determine the exact substances in this defective product.
View the entire letter here (pdf).
Cleaner air = bigger landfill
This article from the New York Times website gives a good idea of the relationship between coal-burning power plants, landfills, the drywall industry, and housing prices. It’s complicated, but it reminds me of the truism that you can’t clean anything without getting something else dirty.
