These photos are of a job I worked on throughout this past spring for a few months. I was amazed on the amount of stone we imported to the site. The final product has a very natural look on the surface, but I became inspired to find out what it actually takes to get these beautiful stones from their birthplace to our walls and patios.
The first effect that occurred to me is the amount of fuel it takes to get from Connecticut, which is where the flagstone we used on this job came from. Connecticut is about 3000 miles from the S.F. Bay. Diesel semi-trucks get about 5 mpg. That equals about 600 gallons of diesel fuel used for a full truckload a stone. We used about 1/2 truckload of Connecticut bluestone (sandstone, flagstone) for this job.
The majority of the stone we used, including the walls, stairs, waterfall, and boulders, are Napa basalt. We received about two semi-truck flatbeds full of this stone. Considering Napa isn't to far from the job site, diesel fuel wasn't a big concern to me, but environmental habitat loss and the mining process was.
My next step is to visit one of the quarries in operation in the Napa and St. Helena area. I want to obtain an environmental impact report as well. It has been difficult finding info on these quarries and I assume visiting one may be a tough task, but I assume an in-person experience will help get the facts I seek.
http://www.dec.ny.gov/lands/5025.html
Above is a photo of a mining operation in N.Y. I want to find out about how permits are obtained for blue-stone mines. This sandstone was formed in the Devonian Age, only a few hundred million years ago.
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