The Surreal Landscapes of Industrial Waste in Russia

At first glance, these landscapes look like something from another planet—stunning expanses of turquoise water, vivid orange rivers, and vast, desolate plains. But beneath their surreal beauty lies a dangerous reality. These are industrial waste sites: ash disposal zones from power plants, sewage drainage channels, and toxic liquid reservoirs scattered across Russia.

Photographer Alexander Sukharev set out to document these hidden hazards. As a co-founder of the Kosmaj Project, he spent months traveling across the country, from Moscow to Vladivostok, using a drone to capture the scale of the damage. What began as a planned visit to a few sites soon became an obsession, leading him to seek out these polluted landscapes in nearly every city he passed.

“The superficial beauty of these places conceals a horrendous threat to the environment,” Sukharev wrote on Twitter. His collection highlights the unsettling contrast between nature’s resilience and the scars left behind by industry. These images serve as a stark reminder of the environmental cost of human progress.