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A sacrifice zone or sacrifice area (often termed a national sacrifice zone or national sacrifice area) is a geographic area that has been permanently changed by heavy environmental alterations (usually to a negative degree) or economic disinvestment, often through locally unwanted land use (LULU). Commentators including Chris Hedges, Joe Sacco, and Steve Lerner have argued that corporate business practices contribute to producing sacrifice zones. A 2022 report by the United Nations highlighted that millions of people globally are in pollution sacrifice zones, particularly in zones used for heavy industry and mining.
Another definition states that sacrifice zones are places damaged through locally unwanted land use causing "chemical pollution where residents live immediately adjacent to heavily polluted industries or military bases."
For Ryan Juskus, sacrifice zones are "geographical areas that bore a disproportionate amount of industrial pollution, toxic chemical exposure, or other environmental harms associated with industry or national security" (p.11). Another important aspect of this definition is that the existence of Sacrifice Zones involves the presence of Abundance Zones. In other words, the disproportionate environmental damage that some communities receive is directly related to maintaining privileges and lifestyles in other geographies. Another important aspect of sacrifice zones is that they are often located in low-income communities with a large presence of ethnic or religious minorities which benefits majority groups.Lerner, S. (2012). Sacrifice zones: the front lines of toxic chemical exposure in the United States. Mit Press.
According to Helen Huntington Smith, the term was first used in the U.S. discussing the long-term effects of strip-mining coal in the American West in the 1970s. The National Academy of Sciences/National Academy of Engineering Study Committee on the Potential for Rehabilitating Lands Surface Mined for Coal in the Western United States produced a 1973 report that introduced the term, finding:
In each zone the probability of rehabilitating an area depends upon the land use objectives, the characteristics of the site, the technology available, and the skill with which this technology is applied. At the extremes, if surface mined lands are declared national sacrifice areas, all ecological zones have a high probability of being successfully rehabilitated. If, however, complete restoration is the objective, rehabilitation in each zone has no probability of success.Similarly in 1975, Genevieve Atwood wrote in Scientific American:National Research Council (U. S.) Study Committee on the Potential for Rehabilitating Lands Surface Mined for Coal in the Western United States (1974). 9780884103318, Ford Foundation Energy Policy Project / Ballinger Pub. Co.. . ISBN 9780884103318
Surface mining without reclamation removes the land forever from productive use; such land can best be classified as a national sacrifice area. With successful reclamation, however, surface mining can become just one of a series of land uses that merely interrupt a current use and then return the land to an equivalent potential productivity or an even higher one.Huntington Smith wrote in 1975, "The Panel that issued the cautious and scholarly National Academy of Sciences report unwittingly touched off a verbal bombshell" with the phrase National Sacrifice Area; "The words exploded in the Western press overnight. Seized upon by a people who felt themselves being served up as 'national sacrifices', they became a watchword and a rallying cry." The term sparked public debate, including among environmentalists and politicians such as future Colorado governor Richard Lamm."Lamm explained his view that Colorado must begin to control its own future, rather than succumbing to Washington's plea that the state should be "a national sacrifice area" to provide for the nation's energy needs."
The term continued to be used in the context of strip mining until at least 1999: "West Virginia has become an environmental sacrifice zone".
/ref> have confirmed the presence of lead, chromium, benzene and other hazardous chemicals in the water supplies of the neighborhood, in amounts far in excess of what is allowed by international regulations. Journalistic and academic research has collected multiple testimonies of serious health diagnoses commonly associated with the presence of these contaminants. Likewise the book explores the effects of toxicity in the daily lives of the residents of the Inflammable neighborhood, referring to multiple diagnoses of lead poisoning among the inhabitants of Inflammable, especially among children.
nowiki/>/ indicates that since 2007, the National Water Commission has issued reports to municipal and state authorities repeatedly informing them of the presence of high levels of heavy metals in the nearby wells, urging the authorities to take action because of the potential health risks posed by the dam. Other effects related to contamination from the dam include damage to crops in the communities neighboring the dam, poisoning of livestock, and stigmatization of agricultural products from the Mezquital Valley region.
Perhaps the best-known sacrifice zone in the United States is "Cancer Alley" in Louisiana, an 85-mile stretch of land along the Mississippi river containing over 200 petrochemical plants. Serious air and water quality violations have been documented since the 1970s, and elevated cancer risk has been found. The region's population is disproportionately black and low-income.
Commentators including Chris Hedges, Joe Sacco, Robert Bullard and Stephen Lerner have argued that corporate business practices contribute to producing sacrifice zones and that these zones most commonly exist in low-income and minority, usually African-American communities. Sacrifice zones are a central topic for the graphic novel Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt, written by Hedges and illustrated by Sacco.
In 2012, Hedges stated that examples of sacrifice zones included Pine Ridge, South Dakota and Camden, New Jersey. In 2017 a West Calumet public housing project in East Chicago, Indiana built at the former site of a lead smelter needed to be demolished and soil replaced to bring the area up to residential standards, displacing 1000 residents. In 2014, Naomi Klein wrote that "running an economy on energy sources that release poisons as an unavoidable part of their extraction and refining has always required sacrifice zones."
/ref> This oil disaster, paradoxically, became a milestone for the abundance of the oil industry in the country.
Erick Camargo indicates that oil spills generated by the lack of maintenance of the complex network of oil infrastructure continue to be a constant and are the main cause of contamination in the lake. However, he also indicates that the use of on nearby crops and the discharge of sewage worsen the situation.Camargo, E. (2023, 21 marzo). El Lago de Maracaibo: un largo historial de contaminación
A 2022 scientific paper reveals the presence of multiple toxic elements in surface sediments in different parts of the lake. This constitutes a high risk for the flora and fauna of the region, as well as for the health of the human communities living in the areas where the samples were taken. Another study in 2007 revealed the presence of toxic metals in part of the subway aquifers connected to the lake basin; the samples taken had values well above the limits allowed for drinking water according to national and international regulations.
Point Nemo is an oceanic point of inaccessibility located inside the South Pacific Gyre. It is selected as the most remote location in the world and serves as a "spacecraft cemetery" for space infrastructure and vessels. Since 1971, 273 spacecraft and satellites have been directed to Point Nemo; this number includes the Mir (142 tonnes) and will include the International Space Station (240 tonnes).
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Space industry
The human-environment interactions that lie at the heart of environmental justice, including sacrifice zones, have been proposed to also include the environmental sacrifice of regions beyond Earth. Klinger states that "the environmental geopolitics of Earth and outer space are inextricably linked by the spatial politics of social privilege and sacrificeamong people, places and institutions". Dunnett has called outer space the 'ultimate sacrifice zone' that exemplifies a Colonialism framed pursuit of Frontier for accumulation, exploitation, and pollution. This manifests in both terrestrial and space-based sacrifice zones related to launch infrastructure, waste, and Space debris.
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