KNOWLEDGE // ARTICLES

The Disruptive Potential of Pyritic Shale Fill

 

Most of us have found a piece of “fool’s gold” in the gem bin at a museum gift shop. While this stable form of pyrite’s claim to fame is fooling the beholder, other finely grained, microscopic, less stable forms of pyrite have long plagued the mining, environmental, transportation, and building industries with its deleterious side effects. This WJE Primer is intended to educate designers, contractors, and others in the building industry about the devastating potential of this mineral when it is sufficiently present in engineered fill materials.