The practice of mountaintop removal (MTR) coal mining has been carried out on at least 500 Appalachian peaks. MTR mining is controversial for its environmental impacts: "Spoil"-the earth and rock dislodged by mining-is deposited in the valleys of this hilly and steep terrain, by some estimates burying almost 2,000 miles of headwater streams that ultimately feed the Mississippi River. Slurry, the residue from cleaning the coal, is impounded in ponds or injected into abandoned underground mine shafts, where it can leach potentially toxic constituents such as arsenic, lead, manganese, iron, sodium, strontium, and sulfare that ultimately may end up in groundwater.
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