Magnesium May Save the Town of Asbestos
A century of mining the deadly mineral yielded a trove of crushed rocks rich in Mg, which can be converted for use in everything from medical implants to Teslas.
Photographer: Christinne Muschi/Bloomberg
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There’s no running away from the past in Asbestos, Quebec.
Its most prominent landmark is a crater more than a mile wide -- and deep enough to hold the Eiffel Tower -- a testament to the world’s once-bottomless appetite for the deadly mineral that sustained the local economy for decades and gave the town its name. Quebec once produced half of the world’s asbestos and offered the highest-paying mining jobs in Canada before concern about cancer led to the fire-resistant fiber being banned in more than 50 countries, with the mine finally shutting down in 2012.