The higher the price of gold, the more destroyed the Amazon forest

The price of gold is increasing in proportion to the destruction of the Amazon forest and the mercury pollution environment is getting worse.

It seems that information about the gold price increase has nothing to do with the destruction of Amazone forest area but in fact it is. Specifically, when the price of gold rises, the more trees are cut down to gain gold, the more mercury is used to extract gold. Mercury evaporates, and enters water sources, food chains.

US, French and Peruvian researchers have used satellite imagery to see deforestation in Madre de Dios, southeastern Peru, six-fold in recent years.

A lot of mercury is used to extract gold. (Source: Livescience )

About 7,000 hectares of primary tropical forests and wetlands were cleared during the period of 2003-2009 . Jennifer Swenson of Duke University said that deforestation is continuing mainly in two mining areas and some scattered locations, mostly along the river. Deforestation is increasing at more than 26% per year.

However, deforestation for mining is not the main factor that destroys the Amazon basin, but is mercury.

Mercury is used to extract gold from the soil manually. The gold miner dug the river bank by using a high-pressure water injection pump. Pump up the spray to push the gold sand to the ground. This sand is mixed with mercury that causes gold particles to cling to mercury.

The mercury gold mixture is heated to mercury evaporation. The ratio of mercury mixed with gold is 2: 1, so Madre de Dios suffered 32 tons of mercury each year because there are 16 tons of gold mined in this area.

The gold collected was then taken to many places for further treatment, by heating to remove mercury nodules.

Therefore, mercury causes environmental pollution in many ways. When flowing into the river, mercury is introduced into the food chain by bacteria. So the fish species in the Amazon River are heavily contaminated with mercury. The content of mercury in many rivers in Peru has exceeded 3 - 25 times the limit.

Mercury poisoning can cause memory loss, muscle weakness, tremor, seizures, headaches, and decreased mental capacity. It affects the development of the fetal nervous system, damaging the brain, kidneys and immune system. Severe mercury poisoning leads to death.