Boatnerd Discussion Forum

When I was a kid the Cobb plant spewed black smoke. After the precipitators were installed they needed to dispose of the fly ash. I guess they lacked a market for it back then. At any rate, they dumped it in the marshes along the Muskegon River. Filled them right in - you can see this still as large grey areas on Google maps.

Portland cement is roughly 85% lime and silica by mass. Historically cement plants in Michigan got the silica content from either clay or shale while limestone provides the lime content.

One example is the cement plant at Alpena, which ran the Paxton shale quarry about 10 miles west of Alpena. Into the mid 1980's the Detroit and Mackinac Railway would haul about 30 carloads of shale each day from Paxton to Alpena at no more than 10 miles per hour on a very minimally maintained branchline. A short time later the plant switched to using flyash as a silica source since huge amounts were available at a low cost. The quarry was closed and the branch line abandoned.

Thanks!

used the manufacture of cement

I see in Vessel Passage that boats take fly ash from the BC Cobb power plant in Muskegon to Charlevoix. Why? What do they do with it there?

Thanks