鑽石舞台

Coal mining has ruined millions of acres of land across the US.

煤炭開採毀掉了美國數百萬英畝的土地。

And it can pollute the surrounding areas for decades after the coal is gone.

礦場關閉後仍會持續污染周圍地區幾十年。

Now, these farmers are restoring coal-mining land with lavender.

如今，這些農民正在用薰衣草恢復採煤地。

Can this farm be a model for lands destroyed by coal mining across the country?

這個農場能成為美國各地治理煤礦開採土地破壞的典範嗎？

We went to Ashford, West Virginia, to find out.

我們去了西弗吉尼亞州的阿什福德，想找出答案。

"When I signed up and I found out it was a lavender farm.

「我報名的時候才發現那是一個薰衣草農場。

And I said, ain't no way.

我心想，這不可能。

I never heard of a lavender farm.

我從沒聽說過薰衣草農場。

I kind of like it.

實際上我還挺喜歡的。

It's my new home."

這裡成了我的新家。」

Aaron Morgan worked as a coal miner for a decade.

亞倫·摩根當了十年的煤礦工人。

"I'm not the only ex-miner here.

「我不是這裡唯一之前當過礦工的。

There's a lot of ex-coal miners here."

這裡有很多以前是煤礦工人的員工。」

He never imagined he would be picking flowers on coal-mining land.

他從未想過自己會在煤礦用地上採花。

"It's strange to me that it's being farmed now.

「現在這裡搞起了種植，讓我覺得有點奇怪。

Because it's really just all rock.

因為這裡都是岩石。

It's a wasteland, really."

這兒真的就是一片荒地。」

Appalachian Botanical Company, or ABCo, is on a retired part of a larger coal mine.

阿巴拉契亞植物公司（簡稱ABCo）位於一個較大煤礦廢棄區。

"Let's go over and meet some of the guys."

「我們過去見見大家吧。」

"My name's Frank.

「我叫弗蘭克。

I've had an assortment of jobs.

我做過各種各樣的工作。

I like this one the best."

最喜歡的就是這份。」

"I don't even work here.

「我甚至都不在這裡工作。

I'm just kind of here."

我只是來了這裡。」

"We do turn a good section of this mountain purple during the blooming season."

「在花季，我們確實給這一大片山染上了紫色。」

The business is part of a reclaiming process that rebuilds the landscape with new vegetation.

這項業務是用新植被重建景觀過程的一部分。

But it's complicated and costly.

但這很複雜，成本也很高。

Imagine blasting the top off of a mountain and then trying to rebuild it piece by piece.

想象一下，炸掉一座山的頂部，然後試圖一塊一塊地重建它。

Growing plants in the soil on mines is tough.

在礦山的土壤中種植植物是很困難的。

But luckily...

但幸運的是……

"Lavender loves poor soils."

「薰衣草喜歡貧瘠的土壤。」

And the sweet-smelling herb can actually reduce toxic heavy metals in the soil.

而且這種芳香的藥草可以減少土壤中的有毒重金屬。

"We make sure the soil tests come back so that there's no heavy metals, no toxins of any kind."

「我們確保等土壤測試結果出來，這樣就沒有重金屬，沒有任何毒素。」

The team harvests the lavender throughout the summer and early fall.

整個夏季和初秋，該團隊都會收穫薰衣草。

ABCo uses every part of the flower.

ABCo公司會利用好花的每一個部分。

So nothing goes to waste.

因此沒有任何廢棄物。

"I need 35 pounds of these buds cut off by tomorrow."

「我需要在明天之前剪下35磅的花蕾。」

They spread the lavender on the floor to cut the buds and bundle the stems to sell for cooking.

他們把薰衣草鋪在地板上，剪下花蕾，把莖捆起來賣給廚師。

"We strip the bottom two leaves off.

「我們把底部的兩片葉子去掉。

And we'll dip that in water and rooting hormone."

我們會把它浸在水和生根激素中。」

They save small leaf clippings and plant them to go more lavender.

他們把剪下的小葉子保存起來，然後種下它們，收穫更多薰衣草。

"This is the 40-gallon pot.

「這是一個40加侖的罐子。

That's a 26-gallon." Matt Carter boils water to steam-distill about 40 pounds of lavender to make essential oil.

這是26加侖的。」馬特·卡特將水煮成水蒸汽，蒸餾大約40磅的薰衣草製成精油。

"Everybody knows that is oil is lighter than water.

「大家都知道油比水輕。

The oil floats to the top.

油會漂浮在水面上。

Just drain the water off of it, which, we keep the water, too."

只要把裡面的水排掉就行了，我們也會把水保留下來。」

They filter the oil three times before bottling it up.

他們先過濾三次油，然後再裝瓶。

They also use the flowers to make creams, honey, salt, and hand sanitizer.

他們還用這種花製作奶油、蜂蜜、鹽和洗手液。

Finally, the leftover plant biomass is transformed into compost.

最後，將剩餘的植物生物質轉化為堆肥。

Coal companies are legally required to restore the land they have mined.

法律要求煤炭公司恢復他們開採過的土地。

After a company drills and blasts a deep pit, it piles all the broken rock and tops soil back into it to reshape the landscape.

一家公司在鑽完一個深坑後，將所有破碎的岩石和表層土壤重新堆進去，重塑景觀。

All that earth gets compacted down to prevent erosion and runoff.

壓實所有土壤以防止侵蝕和流失。

They plant some sort of vegetation and clean the water if need be.

他們會種植一些植物，如果需要的話還會清潔水源。

An old mine can become any number of things.

一座舊礦井可以變成許多東西。

Like a grassland, a home, or in the case of ABCo, a farm.

例如一片草地，一個家園，或者就ABCo來說，變成一個農場。

But does the land actually go back to what it was like before?

但這片土地真的會恢復到以前的樣子嗎？

"It's still fairly rare, I think, for reclamation to be done well."

「我認為，改造工作做得很好的仍然相當罕見。」

Mike is reforesting a 2,500-acre surface mine that has already been reclaimed.

邁克正在一個被改造過的2500英畝的露天煤礦上重新造林。

But he says growing trees in the rocky, compacted soil is really challenging.

但他說，在岩石上和密實土壤中種樹真的很有挑戰性。

They have to rip the soil sometimes 3 or 4 feet to plant anything here.

他們不得不挖開土壤，有時要挖三到四英尺才能在這裡種植任何東西。

"When you stop the mining, it doesn't mean that the pollution stops."

「停止採礦並不意味着污染停止了。」

Layers of rock that have been deep in the earth for millennia are now exposed.

幾千年來埋藏在地下的岩層現在暴露了出來。

"And so they become very active chemically when they're exposed to water.

「所以當它們接觸到水時，化學活性會變得非常強。

Pollutants leech off of those materials for decades, if not hundreds of years."

污染物從這些沒有幾百年也有幾十年的材料中滲出。」

Hundreds of thousands of acres of mining land across the US coalfields haven't been reclaimed yet.

美國各地數十萬英畝的煤礦用地尚未復墾。

"If the mine is stopped and reclamation activity stops, these mines just sort of sit, often as wastelands of bare soil and rock."

「如果停止採礦和復墾活動，這些礦山就會閒置，通常會變成裸露土壤和岩石的荒地。」

And there's a fear that as the coal industry continues to decline, more land could go to waste.

人們擔心，隨着煤炭行業的持續衰落，更多的土地可能會被浪費。

ABCo hopes to expand its farm onto this patch of partially reclaimed land on the mine.

ABCo希望將其農場擴大到礦區這塊部分改造過的土地上。

But for now, it sits idle.

但就目前而言，它處於閒置狀態。

"You can look out there and see all the nasty water just sitting out there and laying.

「你可以看到那些髒水就在那裡淌着。

It's awful, man.

太糟糕了，夥計。

We ain't even allowed out there.

我們甚至都不被允許到那兒去。

I'm assuming that's the reason we're not allowed out there."

我想這就是我們不被允許去那裡的原因。」

"What is most likely is that these mining companies will end up going bankrupt,

「最有可能的是，這些礦業公司最終會破產……

leaving this partially or unreclaimed land without following through on the reclamation obligations."

不再履行改造礦場土地的義務，留下這塊部分或未經改造的土地。」

Unreclaimed mining land can lead to more flooding and landslides.

未改造的礦區可能會加劇洪水和山體滑坡。

"The coal companies stopped working,

「煤炭公司停止了工作。

which meant they also stopped fixing any of the problems that they had created."

這意味着他們也停止去解決他們造成的問題。」

Companies only became responsible for cleaning up old mines in 1977.

公司直到1977年才開始負責清理舊礦。

Before that, they simply abandoned them.

在此之前，他們乾脆直接廢棄。

There are over 6 million acres of abandoned coal mines across the country.

美國有600多萬英畝的廢棄煤礦。

And they're releasing heavy metals and other toxins into the water and air.

它們正在向水和空氣中釋放重金屬和其他毒素。

"You can come in and take some of these off."

「你可以進來把這些剪下來。」

Businesses like ABCo are working to both restore the land and provide jobs here in Boone County, as coal is on its way out.

由於煤炭即將被淘汰，像ABCo這樣的企業正在努力恢復土地，並在布恩縣提供就業機會。

The farm has doubled in size since it broke ground in 2019.

自2019年破土動工以來，該農場的規模已經翻了一番。

"Well, that's a lot of flowers.

「好多的花啊。

That's a lot of lavender.

薰衣草可真夠多的。

It's lot of work.

工作量很大。

That's a lot of employment."

那能創造很多就業機會。」

Along with employing former coal miners, ABCo also hires people in long-term drug recovery.

除了僱傭前煤礦工人外，ABCo還會僱傭經過長期戒藥的人員。

"I like working here.

「我喜歡在這裡工作。

Because they gave me the opportunity to show that my past is in the past.

因為他們給我機會來證明，我的過去已經成為過去了。

They were still willing to work with me.

他們仍然願意和我一起工作。

And it was great that somebody gave me a chance to show that I can do this."

有人給了我一個機會來證明我能做到這些，這太棒了。」

"And so when we reclaim, we don't just reclaim land.

「所以當我們改造土地時，我們不只是改造土地。

We reclaim land, people, communities, everything."

我們改造土地、人、社區，所有一切。」

Reclaiming mine land is one step toward a post-coal future.

改造礦區是邁向後煤炭時代未來的一步。

The Biden administration has committed to investing $260 million in reclamation efforts for states and tribes.

拜登政府承諾投資2.6億美元，用於各州和部落的土地復墾工作。

And ABCo hopes to use some of that money to expand the business to more of West Virginia.

ABCo希望利用其中的一部分資金將業務擴大到西弗吉尼亞州的更多地區。

"If that is funded, it will enable us to set up a new farm location in a neighboring county and set up a regional community hub there."

「如果這筆資金到位，它將使我們能夠在鄰近的縣建立一個新的農場位置，並在那裡建立一個區域社區中心。」

But the US government is still adding one more hurdle to cleaning up abandoned mine land.

但美國政府在清理廢棄礦區方面仍增加了一個障礙。

The proposed infrastructure bill would reduce the tax on coal production that funds these reclamation projects.

擬議的基礎設施法案將減少為這些復墾項目提供資金的煤炭生產的稅收。

"The Appalachian region, they've sacrificed a lot for energy that has really built this country.

「阿巴拉契亞地區，他們為打造美國的能源犧牲了很多。

We as a nation owe it to this region to fix some of these inadequacies."

作為一個國家，我們有責任為這個地區彌補這些不足。」

Appalachia has a long way to go to clean up the mess created by generations of mining.

要清理幾代人採礦造成的爛攤子，阿巴拉契亞還有很長的路要走。

But these flowers give hope for a blossoming future.

但這些花朵給人們帶來了綻放未來的希望。

"A lot of times you get a ripple effect in the water, right?

「很多時候你會在水中產生漣漪效應，對嗎？

We don't make a ripple, we make a wave."

我們不會掀起漣漪，我們會激起波浪。」