The Congo Tantalum Rush 230
Logic Bomb writes: "The New York Times Magazine takes a look at the mining of a muddy substance called coltan. Once refined, it becomes tantalum, the crucial ingredient in capacitors. To put it simply, the modern high-tech world depends on this stuff. And while most of us have images of squeaky-clean chip factories and such -- in marked contrast to sleazy textile sweatshops -- it turns out that this industry has a dark side that takes a major toll on human lives. Definitely worth a read."
Re:No surprise there (Score:3, Informative)
They've undertaken huge clean-up projects at most of their bases, plan every exercise & project for minimal environmental impact, and try to stay in strict compliance with US and state or host-nation environmental laws. Unlike many corporations that would rather pay the fines for non-compliance when it's cheaper.
I speak from personal experience, in Air Force Civil Engineering. The construction projects I was involved in used high efficiency HVAC systems, low energy lighting, motion sensors that automatically turn lights off when rooms aren't in use, super-insulated buildings, toilets that use less water volume per flush, etc. These things all cost more up front, but have lower long-range operating costs. Now that I'm working in the private sector, commercial & residential clients forgo these systems for more traditional, environmentally unfriendly systems.
Energy conservation wasn't even spoken about in the media in recent years, until Califonia's self inflicted energy crisis. The military has been heavily promoting it internally for several years.
There was even a
Re:Another article (Score:4, Informative)
These were also months ago....
Evidently it wasn't interesting then as my submission got rejected.... the heck with Karma...
Re:No surprise there (Score:3, Informative)
The kicker about Hunter's Point is that the city is really having to lean on the Navy hard to get them to clean the place up. They only this year quietly admitted the existence of the radioactive goop. Before, we thought it was just PCBs!
Not the "crucial ingredient in capacitors" (Score:5, Informative)
The nice thing about tantalums is that they are very small for the amount of capacitance they have - hence their popularity in PDAs and celphones. But they're expensive, and polarised - you have to plug them in the right way, or they literally blow up. They also can't tolerate much overvoltage.
For the things that tantalums are most often used for (power-supply filtering), a kind of capacitor called multilayer ceramic actually works better. These are made mostly from nickel powder, and they're much cheaper and tougher. They're also non-polarised, which can reduce assembly costs, and they don't depend on hard-to-get tantalum powder.
Last year there was a shortage of tantalum powder, which made tantalum caps really hard to get. Now word is getting out that the new breed of multilayer ceramic chip caps can do just as well, people aren't using tantalums nearly as much as they were. I think this is the real reason for the tantalum ore crash.
"Clean rooms" in this country killed people too (Score:4, Informative)
"... Today, the valley is home to more EPA Superfund sites (29) than any other county in the nation, with the most notorious of those sites -- from a leaking tank at a Fairchild Semiconductor fabrication plant -- poisoning a well that served the south San Jose neighborhood of Los Paseos. A subsequent study by the state's Department of Health Services found 2.5 to three times the expected rate of miscarriages and birth defects among pregnant women exposed to the contaminated drinking water, leading to a lawsuit and multimillion-dollar settlement in 1986 with over 250 claimants...."
Full two-part story at Salon, 7/30/01 and 7/31/01:
http://www.salon.com/tech/feature/2001/07/30/almad en1/index.html [salon.com]
Re:And the point is? (Score:5, Informative)
If anything, the establishment of mining and factories will add stability to the region, since the companies want to protect their money and investment.
Secondly, did you actually read the article? There are no companies. There are no factories. And those mines are holes in the ground dug by people (roughly organized into "camps"). It's still anarchy, not good financial planning.
Besides, you only get to mine your natural resources once, then they're gone. The article says that the money from coltan mining is not going into infrastructure like schools and roads. So what happens when the coltan is gone? Evenyone's actually worse off than they started, because there's no more money to be made by mining, and you've gained nothing that can increase the country's wealth in the long run (like schools!) in return.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but hasn't the Congo been mined for diamonds for 100+ years now? Has it done any good? Why do you think the coltan situation will be different?
Re:And the point is? (Score:2, Informative)
Racist and false.
You haven't the foggiest idea what you're talking about. None. You are a typical uneducated spoiled pampered suburban neoliberal slob with no knowledge of history other than the occasional tidbits you manage to pick up from Hollywood movies.
Here's a bibliography [uct.ac.za] for you. Go read some of the works cited, if you can find any that don't exceed your reading level. Then come back and express an informed opinion.
Not exactly news (Score:2, Informative)
No surprise there (Score:5, Informative)
Re:annoying (Score:3, Informative)
Hello, Ignorant Moron. (Score:3, Informative)
These rebel gangs then sell the product to American and European corporations.
Sounds like a major toll to me. But you're right, none of those farmers are starving now. Enjoy your electronic devices.
Another article (Score:4, Informative)
Link to great info about DRC (Score:2, Informative)