Big Changes for the Land

BY AWAKE! WRITER IN GERMANY

“LEAVING our home nearly broke my wife’s heart,” said Dieter. “Michaela, our 11-year-old daughter, got all choked up too. But we had no choice.” Are these the words of a family of refugees fleeing a war zone? No, this family lives in one of the mining regions of Germany.

Over the past 55 years, some 33,000 people in Germany’s Rhineland shared the same fate as Dieter and his family. They were resettled to make way for opencut mining of lignite, or brown coal. Increasing industrial demand for energy means that some 180 million tons of lignite is taken from opencut mines each year in Germany alone. That is equivalent to about 25 times the estimated weight of the Cheops Pyramid in Egypt.

What effect does this have on the land and on the people who live on it? Brockhaus Enzyklopädie states: “Large-scale opencut mining often entails widespread resettlement and drastic changes.” a Let us take a look at opencut mining in the Rhineland and at the people whose lives have been affected by it.

Opencut Mining for Lignite

The Cologne-Aachen basin on the Lower Rhine River is the largest single lignite region in Europe. This area is almost as large as the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg or Yosemite National Park in California, U.S.A. The lignite is found below the surface, covered by layers of gravel, sand, or clay, which first need to be scraped away. These top layers are called the overburden.

To get at the lignite, bucket-wheel excavators strip away the overburden. One such excavator removes enough overburden each day to fill 16,000 semitrailers. To prevent the sides from caving in as the mine goes deeper and deeper, the cut is made to form terraces, or steps. Individual working levels on the excavating side of the mine are called benches. Look at the bucket-wheel excavators working on these benches, pictured above. They are some of the largest machines in the world. At a height of 310 feet [95 m], they are about twice as tall as New York’s Statue of Liberty.

Once it has been stripped off by an excavator, the overburden is taken away by conveyor. Try to imagine how much material has to be transported. For each cubic yard [m³] of coal extracted in Germany’s Rhineland, over 4.6 cubic yards [over 6 m³] of overburden has to be removed. The material moves along the  conveyors rapidly; we would be hard pressed to keep up with it, even if riding a bicycle. The conveyors meet at an assembly point. From there the various materials are transported to coal bunkers, loaded onto railway cars, and taken to power stations or deposited on a dump. Most of the lignite is taken to power stations to be used in generating energy.

As far as possible, the overburden is used to refill areas where the lignite has been extracted. The machines that do the refilling are called spreaders. They pour the soil into the mine, layer by layer, until the hole is filled. Any remaining overburden is placed on outside dumps. These are mounds that can be up to 650 feet [200 m] high. Integrating these mounds of overburden into the countryside and making them useful for agriculture and forestry presents landscapers with a real challenge.

Lowering the Groundwater Table

Opencut mining inevitably has a major impact on the landscape and on natural cycles. To keep the opencut mine dry, the groundwater table is lowered to a level below the deepest point of the mine. The amount of water pumped out each year in Germany would fill the needs of the residents of Germany’s largest city, Berlin, for almost three and a half years. The extraction of so much water concerns environmentalists, who are particularly worried about the threat to the nearby Maas-Schwalm-Nette Nature Park, situated on the border of Germany and the Netherlands. This park is a natural wetland, providing habitat for many plants and birds.

Those in charge of the opencut mine have given assurance that there is no reason for concern. To make up for the water pumped out when mining, water is being put back into the ground a short distance from the mine. This is done in part by means of seepage wells. In this way it is hoped that the region will be kept from drying out.

A New Landscape Takes Shape

The earth is in a state of constant change. Some 25,000 million tons of sediment are swept into the oceans each year, without our even noticing it. Changes to the landscape are more obvious, however, to a person standing at the edge of an opencut mine. Here a new landscape takes shape. What has this meant for the Rhineland lignite area?

In the Cologne-Aachen basin, areas previously mined have been reclaimed and turned into agricultural land, forests, and parks. Moreover, watercourses have been diverted, as have roads and railroads. Lignite Mining in the Rhineland explains: “[Reclamation] is not the attempt to reproduce nature. Man can only provide initial assistance. The major part of the work is done by nature itself.” So far, over 65 percent of the land affected has been made reusable, the largest area being used for agriculture. For that purpose, fertile topsoil was spread as evenly as possible to a depth of six feet [2 m] on top of the permeable spoil. For several years company-owned farms cultivated the area, after which the land was released for general agricultural use.

A small sector of the new forests and artificial lakes have become conservation areas  protected by law. Some endangered species have even made the reclaimed areas their home. The delicate butterfly called the poplar admiral and birds such as the great reed warbler are just two of these. In addition, plants such as the common bladderwort and the military orchid are there. Residents of the cities of Cologne and Bonn have discovered the former opencut mine to be a place where they can go to rest and relax.

Resettlement and a New Start

One of the most challenging tasks associated with opencut mining is the resettlement of people living directly on top of the lignite. Whole communities have to be moved before mining can commence.

Resettlement requires major planning, which starts some 10 to 15 years ahead of the event. Efforts are made to keep village communities together when they are moved to a new location. Experience has shown that about half the people affected want to stay within the same community with their neighbors, whereas others see the move as a chance to make a fresh start elsewhere. People forced to move are compensated, but putting a value on some things is impossible. For instance, how can you be compensated for the loss of the wonderful view you have out your living room window or the close relationships you enjoy with your neighbors? Everything might be different in your new environment.

Resettlement is more than just moving houses; mining alters the environment forever. Parents never have the chance to show their children where they grew up and went to school. One’s childhood home is gone forever. How do people cope with the situation? Awake! asked some of them.

Friedhelm lives in a village that is about to be resettled. Building a new house​—for him, the second time around—​at his age is not a welcome prospect. “Building the first house taught us many valuable lessons,” says Inge, his wife, “but we no longer have the strength to do it again.” Constructing a new home, which may involve living on a building site for some years, can present a real challenge.

Werner and Margarethe think that most people gain materially from being moved. But certain groups​—such as the elderly, farmers, and tradesmen—​are hit particularly hard. For some people who have their own business, starting up again in a new location is simply too expensive. One farmer who resettled and who ran his new farm on reclaimed land for over 20 years says he thinks things have turned out reasonably well. His attitude is, “Make the best of the situation, for it cannot be changed anyway.”

How true that is! In time, Dieter and his family, mentioned at the beginning, also grew accustomed to their new home. They are just three of the many people who can say from experience that opencut mining brings big changes for the land and those who live on it.

[Footnote]

[Picture on page 21]

A bucket-wheel excavator mines for lignite

[Credit Line]

Rheinbraun AG

[Pictures on page 23]

A spreader fills the mine with fertile soil

A former opencut mine transformed

[Credit Line]

All photos: Rheinbraun AG