A visual construction history of the West Lothian shale bings

Abstract

The West Lothian shale bings are large deposits of spent-shale rock in Scotland, created by the first industrial scale oil refineries which operated in the region from the mid-19th to the mid-20th century. Through its visual format, this gallery essay eschews formal investigative strategies to break with previous scholarship and interpret the bings as structures with their own construction history. Images of their current shape have been substituted for plans, photos and representations of them in development, to highlight the various logics and designs that converged within their construction. First-hand accounts from archived interviews have also been used to integrate the sensory and personal information that animated the bings as they were built. Social production is centred in this way to undermine an ideological narrative that sees waste as either aberrant corollary to intensive industry, or a neutral object without history. Analysing each image of the bings reveals intent, calculation and purpose which are pointedly incongruous with the view of waste as monolithic, accidental or unconscious. Such interpretations must be challenged because they obfuscate the necessarily profound impact of capital upon environmental history, as well as denuding ecology of its social aspects.