Machine from South Africa could turn Butte, Montana into the mine remediation capital of the United States.

"Everyone who knows this business says that it’s so simple, but it works," said Sofus Michelsen, one of three partners in a company called Refunsa Plains LLC that hopes to make and distribute the machines in the United States with Butte as the launching site.

A lot must happen before then, first among them getting positive results from tests to show if the machine can – as its promoters say – efficiently separate and remove arsenic, lead, mercury and other harmful metals from mine tailings.

The machine – here called the PET4K Processing Plant – uses only water and pressure and can be set at various gravity levels to target and remove specific metals even at minuscule sizes, all in process.

MIKE SMITH [email protected]

http://helenair.com/news/state-and-regional/can-african-machine-produce-a-promising-future-in-butte/article_1874e825-b67c-54fb-ab05-2670cbce8851.html