I have seen the underlying item, but my Google Alert for "taconite tailings" just gave me this link, to go with my morning coffee.
It is not news to many who have read anything on this blog, or elsewhere about use of taconite tailings in paving aggregate in the road bed in front of your home.
Larry wants it done, Larry was paid to do the study, Larry likes tailings, and at the end of the abstract it is clear that, "In terms of the marketing potential, low-cost rail transportation and a workable distribution plan would be key for expanding the use of coarse taconite tailings as aggregate in markets beyond Northeastern Minnesota."
And that quoted part from the link explains Elwyn Tinklenberg's major if not sole concern with the stuff. He is not health risk oriented. He is a promoter for use of the stuff, whatever the current state of knowledge and the uncertainties of health risks might be.
The quoted text is what Tinklenberg has been and apparently still is being paid money to want to see done. It is what you can read of and see how he has focused upon that as his personal goal, in his reporting to NRRI to justify his continuing contract status with NRRI. He has touted his many and varied thoughts and efforts to contact people to advance the stuff being disseminated exactly in the way that above quoted text envisions. It is his mission with NRRI, that sentence basically being his mission statement.
Marketing the stuff and arranging low-cost shipping ways and means is why Elwyn Tinklenberg contacted shippers and railways, and went to trade shows, (Mesabi Hard Rock hockey puck in hand), to influence and impress people.
It is why he produced a repeatedly played trade-show short video presentation for that marketing purpose, for use in marketing "Mesabi Hard Rock" at trade shows; a video which his campaign people have yet to put on YouTube - for the rest of us - those whose vote Elwyn solicits.
This is posted because it conveniently fits the longer posting, below, from earlier this morning.
So, hey --- Pick a cup, any cup.
_______UPDATE_______
I believe I must emphasize this as strongly as possible. This link is very, very important. It gives you online access to the underlying study Larry Zanko did at NRRI.
You can read it and form your own opinions about whether it entirely begs the question of whether there is or is not any inherent health hazard in the taconite tailings material, itself, independent of any questions over whether it contains asbestos when from the east end of the Iron Range or from the west end.
Whether it's from east or west of a boundary line, is it safe or unsafe, independent of when and if it does or does not contain asbestos?
Does Zanko answer that? Does he even consider it? Are taconite fibers and/or clevage fragments the problem independent of asbestos considerations?
Read the entire Zanko thing.
Think for yourself. Figure things out for yourself. Does Zanko's work beg the question of whether or not taconite fibers and/or cleavage fragments pose a health risk even if asbestos is not a minor component?
