Environmental groups are calling for action to clean up thousands of tonnes of hazardous aluminum smelting waste they say was dumped without proper disposal management and could harm the health of residents in Greater Kaohsiung.
A total of 5,782 tonnes of furnace dust from secondary aluminum smelters is sitting in five Greater Kaohsiung districts, illegally disposed of by an industrial waste treatment company that handled waste from 22 aluminum companies.
The illegal treatment company was seized and the owners -sentenced in 2008; however, the waste remains in iron-covered rental storage units on six sites in Kaohsiung’s Niaosong, (鳥松), Renwu (仁武), Dashe (大社), Yanchao (燕巢) and Yungan (永安) districts.
For the past three years, neither the local government nor the aluminum companies have done anything to manage the waste, and the landowner and nearby residents are being affected by the noxious smell emanating from the storage units, the groups said.
“The odor permeates the whole community, and people can’t stand it. Everyone is annoyed by it,” said Tsai Huang Ching-huang (蔡黃景煌), head of a village in Niaosong.
Another Niaosong resident said that sometimes the smell is so strong that she could not sleep at night.
Environmental groups inspected a storage site in Niaosong District on Wednesday and found up to 3,000 tonnes of waste in bulk bags filling the storage units to capacity. Some of the bags were already damaged with furnace dust falling out, and the air was filled with an overwhelming chemical smell, the inspecting group members said.
According to the environmental group, the site has been designated as a soil pollution control site by the government because of excessive levels of cadmium and copper found in the soil.
The waste contains aluminum nitride and aluminum carbide, which when mixed with water can create ammonia and methane, which, if inhaled, can cause coughing, headaches, nausea, vomiting, chest tightness and even hypoxia or suffocation at high densities.
“Businesspeople should face the problems courageously, and deal with the problems that they caused,” Huang Huan-chang (黃煥彰), organizer of an environmental protection program at Tainan Community University and an associate professor at Chunghua University of Medical Technology’s Department of Nursing said.
The environmental groups urged the 22 aluminum companies to take responsibility for the waste they created. They also called for the local government environmental protection agency to take firm action and for the Environmental Protection Administration to review its measures on toxic waste.
Greater Kaohsiung Environmental Protection Bureau Deputy Director Tsai Meng-yu (蔡孟裕) said it would cost an estimated NT$200 million (US$6.92 million) to clean up the waste. Tsai added the bureau would also negotiate with the companies about treatment methods.
Saying that the bureau has informed the land owner that it will make regular inspections at the site starting this week, Joan Tsai (蔡卉荀), a member of Citizens of the Earth, said she hoped that the local government and the companies could come to an agreement and solve the problem this year.
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