George Monbiot has become very excited by proposals for open cast coal extraction in South Wales that seemingly leave the tax payer with the most of the expense of remediation i.e. 'clearing up' after the process has finished (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/apr/28/big-coal-keep-it-in-the-ground-energy-opencast-mines). It is certainly the case that local communities can be left with gigantic holes in their adjoining environment, unstable masses of land and contaminated water courses. He claims that the companies who push for such developments often are required to post bonds that only pay for a fraction of the 'clean up' but exert pressures on planning bodies by making claims about local employment. Only rarely do the environmental costs seem to feature much. This seems to have a long tradition as many old quarries leave holes in many parts of the world. I have also worried about whether activities as diverse as the current hydroelectric developments in the Indian Himalayas (an earthquake zone) or the 'lagoon' proposed for Swansea Bay have adequate remediation costs built in if they eventually prove to be non-viable?
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