Industrial Waste is Turning Into Rock in Just Decades, Study Suggests

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Industrial Waste Is Turning Into Rock in Just Decades, Study Suggests:

The geological processes that create rocks usually take place over thousands if not millions of years. With the help of a coin and a soda can tab, researchers have identified rocks in England that formed in less than four decades. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the cause is human activity.

Researchers from the University of Glasgow's School of Geographical and Earth Sciences discovered that slag (a waste product of the steel industry) formed a new type of rock in West Cumbria in 35 years-at most. As detailed in a study published April 10 in the journal Geology, the researchers claim to be the first to fully document and date a complete "rapid anthropoclastic rock cycle" on land: a significantly accelerated rock cycle that incorporates human-made materials. They suggest that this phenomenon is likely harming ecosystems and biodiversity at similar industrial waste locations around the world.

"When waste material is first deposited, it's loose and can be moved around as required. What our finding shows is that we don't have as much time as we thought to find somewhere to put it where it will have minimal impact on the environment-instead, we may have a matter of just decades before it turns into rock, which is much more difficult to manage," co-author Amanda Owen said in a university statement.

During the 19th and 20th centuries, Derwent Howe in West Cumbria hosted heavy iron and steel industries. The 953 million cubic feet (27 million cubic meters) of slag generated by the factories turned into cliffs along the coastline, where strange formations along the human-made cliffs caught Owen and her colleagues' attention, according to the statement.

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