Tailings ponds can overflow?

[NewSwiss]

I had a tailings pond for tar that was getting full, then next thing I know, it's half empty and the ground for like 6 tiles in each direction is black and slow to walk on...

Is this just what happens if you let them get too full? Does the spill eventually clear up?

[immortal_sniper1]

I had a tailings pond for tar that was getting full, then next thing I know, it's half empty and the ground for like 6 tiles in each direction is black and slow to walk on...

Is this just what happens if you let them get too full? Does the spill eventually clear up?

YES
and NO
but it is free landfill and it can catch fire

[Nexela]

but it is free landfill

Temporarily Possibly as one of the ToDos is 'fix for water tiles'

Does the spill eventually clear up?

Not currently..... But maybe something to add in the future!

[NewSwiss]

but it is free landfill and it can catch fire

It can catch fire? How long does it burn for? Does it change after burning? Also, how is it affected by laying bricks on top of it?

[NewSwiss]

Also, is there a bug with how the Py buildings express pollution? Looking at my production tab, it's showing pollution consumption being like 5 times as high as pollution generation for the whole game (where is this extra coming from?), and on the map it shows lots of pollution spreading from my factory...

[kingarthur]

Also, is there a bug with how the Py buildings express pollution? Looking at my production tab, it's showing pollution consumption being like 5 times as high as pollution generation for the whole game (where is this extra coming from?), and on the map it shows lots of pollution spreading from my factory...

Farm like structures eat pollution. A lot of it. Although if they aren't placed in the right spot the pollution will still spread out from the buildings in all directions

[BlueTemplar]

There might be a few bugs with buildings emitting (since 0.17.12?) a lot less pollution than intended ?
viewtopic.php?p=443153#p443153

[NewSwiss]

Farm like structures eat pollution. A lot of it. Although if they aren't placed in the right spot the pollution will still spread out from the buildings in all directions

If by "a lot of it" you mean more than is emitted by 400 of Py's other buildings combined? Because pretty much every Py building I have claims to be emitting 0.06 pollution per minute, and yet a single fawogae plantation claims to consume 25 pollution per minute. I know for a fact that my base is emitting MUCH more pollution than the bulding stats claim, since the entire area around me is red, despite the pollution production window claiming that all of the pollution is being taken care of.

There might be a few bugs with buildings emitting (since 0.17.12?) a lot less pollution than intended ?
viewtopic.php?p=443153#p443153

See the screenshots here:

https://imgur.com/a/x07LBpJ

The amount of pollution being produced is correct, but the amount being shown (both on the production tab and by the machines) is clearly WAY too small.

[Light]

Overflowing tailing ponds is probably the feature I liked most. Keep them managed and you won't heavily pollute the land, just like the real deal.

Land reclamation and decontamination is an involved process though. It would be neat to see that restoration added to the mod someday.

[ZombieMooose]

Overflowing tailing ponds is probably the feature I liked most. Keep them managed and you won't heavily pollute the land, just like the real deal.

Land reclamation and decontamination is an involved process though. It would be neat to see that restoration added to the mod someday.

Especially in alien life. I feel greening up the world would fit right in the theme.

[NewSwiss]

Overflowing tailing ponds is probably the feature I liked most. Keep them managed and you won't heavily pollute the land, just like the real deal.

It's neat and all, but kind-of bogus without a warning. Every other storage system in every mod I've ever played just stops flow when it fills. It's not like the floating bob in a toilet tank is a complicated mechanism...

[BlueTemplar]

Well, you can just use one of the many Py tanks instead if you don't want to deal with that behaviour...

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Farm like structures eat pollution. A lot of it. Although if they aren't placed in the right spot the pollution will still spread out from the buildings in all directions

If by "a lot of it" you mean more than is emitted by 400 of Py's other buildings combined? Because pretty much every Py building I have claims to be emitting 0.06 pollution per minute, and yet a single fawogae plantation claims to consume 25 pollution per minute. I know for a fact that my base is emitting MUCH more pollution than the bulding stats claim, since the entire area around me is red, despite the pollution production window claiming that all of the pollution is being taken care of.

There might be a few bugs with buildings emitting (since 0.17.12?) a lot less pollution than intended ?
viewtopic.php?p=443153#p443153

See the screenshots here:

https://imgur.com/a/x07LBpJ

The amount of pollution being produced is correct, but the amount being shown (both on the production tab and by the machines) is clearly WAY too small.

I specifically meant Py buildings. (Check out the link that I gave if you haven't done it yet.)

[NewSwiss]

Well, you can just use one of the many Py tanks instead if you don't want to deal with that behaviour...

Well look at you Mr "I have so much duralumin that I don't hesitate to use actual storage tanks" ...

I hate this type of "If you don't like it, then do something else" responses. I think I've managed to make a total of less than 100 duralumin all game due to being surrounded by biters, and all storage tanks require it. It was actually easier for me to just make a lot of pipe sections to hold coal gas rather than try to build a tank. While I think it's dumb to have the tailings ponds flood rather than just shutting off flow, my main gripe is that there is no warning about that. If I had built a storage entity myself, I would know that it had no auto-shutoff when full, unlike EVERY OTHER STORAGE ENTITY.

I specifically meant Py buildings. (Check out the link that I gave if you haven't done it yet.)

I clicked that link (that's my older post, BTW), and it was some people making the claim that it was hard-coded for too little pollution. I can say firsthand that it is just a display bug, and that the buildings actually produce a LOT of pollution, but it isn't displaying properly.

[BlueTemplar]

Ah, my bad, in latest 0.16 some of the storage tanks still "only" need lead and iron...
(An alternative, which I actually use for all liquids, is just to make sure that a Tailings pond never gets filled - I do it by adding a new one when the fluid level gets to more than 50%...)

Yeah, the Tailings pond description should really be updated !

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And that was me looking at game data for boilers & turbines...

Are you sure about the pollution being from Py buildings rather than vanilla ones ?
Because it's hard to tell from your screenshots...
(except maybe that the top left block doesn't seem to produce a lot, but perhaps it's the nurseries / fawongae farms ?

Sorry, but if you don't get an avatar (or at least a signature), it's kind of hard to remember that you're the same person !

[Light]

Overflowing tailing ponds is probably the feature I liked most. Keep them managed and you won't heavily pollute the land, just like the real deal.

It's neat and all, but kind-of bogus without a warning. Every other storage system in every mod I've ever played just stops flow when it fills. It's not like the floating bob in a toilet tank is a complicated mechanism...

Haha.

Tailing ponds aren't toilets though, they're literal ponds dug in the ground and either expanded to satisfy demand or re-routed to other ponds based on how full they are. There's a lot of math involved to determine evaporation, output, etc. It's not my department so I can't explain much further, but we have an entire team for tailings and environmental protection that would probably write you a novel on it.

The only way to replicate that behavior in Factorio is to create an entity that can overflow since there are no water levels in the game that can rise or fall. It's up to you to keep the tailings pond from overflowing or polluting the land around it, just as it is in real life. Either increase the ponds, decrease the output of tailings, or find other storage methods to re-route once the pond evaporates enough. (I'm pretty sure the tailings evaporates in Py over time to allow that.)

Nauvis Day is one mod where you can spill the contents of any entity containing fluid. The contaminants are spilled on the ground and create remarkable amounts of pollution, meaning you must empty any tank/pipe/entity storing fluids before deconstructing it or you'll create a major pollution cloud with your spill that destroys all the trees around it and spike the biter evolution. This is far more punishing than tailings spills if the tank is large and full of liquid that's not water.

[kingarthur]

(I'm pretty sure the tailings evaporates in Py over time to allow that.)

They do not. They remove some when spilling but theres is no "evaporation"

[Riktol]

The thing with the tailings pond is it's a one off, no other tank or pipe has the same behavior so it's a bit of a gotcha and then you tech into proper tanks and forget it was a thing that happened to you. I overwrote the overflow sludge with stone bricks.

Are there any mods which use this or a similar mechanic in more depth?

[BlueTemplar]

The closest thing I can think of is :
https://mods.factorio.com/mod/WaterAsAResource