Anthropocene Ashes: Carbon Omissions and Toxic Stratigraphy in Tocopilla (Chile)

Abstract

This article offers a transdisciplinary critique of “carbon neutrality”. We present a situated analysis of energy production for large-scale copper and lithium mining in the
city of Tocopilla (northern Chile). Examining the social and material transformations
triggered by the production of energy for large-scale mining during the 20th century,
this article problematizes carbon neutrality by demonstrating how large-scale mining
corporations in Chile claim emissions reduction by producing carbon omissions, most notably by ignoring the toxic sediments of fuel combustion. We see these residues as the ashes of the Anthropocene. To render them visible, we experiment with a situated toxic stratigraphy, aimed at visualizing the historical processes that preceded the accumulation of ash on the Quaternary sediments of the coastal bluff. This visualization also explores the current and future effects of the interaction between stratigraphic layers. Ultimately, our analysis of Tocopilla shows how the carbon neutrality claimed by the mining industry functions as a capitalist abstraction, one that can only succeed by omitting the material and toxic transformations triggered by the so-called
energy transition, which in the material world is actually a mining transition.