Becoming a Nimby

Three years have gone by since my last blog entry. A lot has happened during the past three years and I just felt far too busy to commit to writing a blog.

But today I decided to start writing again. Not about my travels, because I do not travel very much these days. Not about human evolution, because we don’t organize excursions to beautiful Les Eyzies anymore. Not about the Asian monsoon, because this research project is almost finished. Rather I plan to write about what it means to be nimby (= not in my backyard) and how this changed the way I look at the world.

Last year we received a letter from Bergsstaten, the Mining Inspectorate of Sweden, telling us that a company called Scandivanadium has acquired exploration permits for among others the land we own and where our summer house is in beautiful Österlen in Southeasten Sweden. The company had obtained exploration permits for an area of 21 792,92 ha in Southeastern Sweden, a region which is rich in culture and heavy on agriculture and in addition an attractive tourist destination.

Scandivanadium wants to explore the possibilities to mine Vanadium, a metal which is present in high concentrations in the Alum Shale, and which has gained importance during the past years as a component in redox-flow batteries. Right after the letter from Bergsstaten had arrived, my new Nimby career started. Not because I was afraid that our land could be turned into a mine – if that would happen, then I would just move elsewhere – but because I knew how geochemically complicated Alum Shale is, especially when exposed to weathering. But let’s not jump ahead and rather start with the basics and gradually move on from one topic to the next.

So what is Alum Shale? It is a black organic-rich shale that some 500 million years ago (Middle Cambrium to the lower Ordovicium) was deposited as clay in a large ocean basin. It is known for its high content of various metals and minerals (see for example Schovsbo 2003 or Erlström et al. 2004). The Alum Shale formation has historically been divided into three parts: the lowest is called Paradoxides Series, the middle part is termed Olenid Series and the upper part is termed Dictyonema Shale. These names stem from the fossils found in the shale.

The Swedish Dictyonema Shale has been known for a very long time for its exceptionally high Vanadium content. And it is this part of the Alum Shale, the Dictyonema Shale, which has now attracted the attention of Scandivanadium.

References

Schovsbo, N. H. 2003. The geochemistry of lower Paleozoic sediments deposited on the margins of Baltica. Bulletin of the Geological Society of Denmark. Vol. 50, p. 11-27.

Erlström, M. et al. 2004. Beskrivning till berggrundskartorna 2D Tomelilla NV, NO, SV, SO; 2E Simrishamn NV, SV; 1D Ystad NV, NO; 1E Örnahusen NV. Sveriges Geologiska Undersökning Af 212-214.