Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
Wasting the Nation.indd - Groundwork
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Chapter 4: The toxic cradle of productionSasol’s SDR leaves out <strong>the</strong> mountains of ash produced each year, previously reportedat over 10 million tonnes in Secunda and 1.8 mt in Sasolburg. This is because Sasolis now ‘recycling’ its ash by selling it off to brick makers. The Sasolburg SH&Ereports just short of 1.6 mt ash sold in 2006. This figure includes ash mined from itsold dumps. The ash contains various toxic residues, including heavy metals such asmercury, that leach from <strong>the</strong> dumps and into water so recycling this ash should resultin local environmental benefits. Never<strong>the</strong>less, <strong>the</strong> toxic residues will remain in <strong>the</strong>bricks. They are <strong>the</strong>refore dispersed into <strong>the</strong> built environment and will be releasedover time: eventually <strong>the</strong> bricks will crumble or be crushed as buildings are demolishedor paving is ripped up.Sasol is now also selling spent catalyst and waste waxes to clay brick makers. Thiscontributed to a substantial reduction in hazardous waste from its Sasol One site from14,851 tonnes in 2005 to 4,257 tonnes in 2006. The corporation makes no commenton <strong>the</strong> final fate of <strong>the</strong> toxic material. As with ash bricks, however, this is effectively astrategy of dispersing toxic waste in space and time.Catalysts are used to create chemical reactions in both <strong>the</strong> refining and chemicalsindustries. In oil refineries, catalysts ‘crack’ heavy fuel oil to produce a higherproportion of more valuable light elements such as petrol or diesel. In Sasol’s process,catalysts react with ‘syngas’ to produce synfuels and a variety of chemicals. The catalystis designed for specific processes but generally composed of grains of metal oxidecoated with o<strong>the</strong>r metals. Commonly used minerals include iron, aluminium, nickel,cobalt, vanadium and potassium. In production, <strong>the</strong> catalyst is contaminated and isconstantly regenerated until it is degraded beyond use. Waste catalyst is choked withheavy metals and highly toxic.Sasol’s Natref refinery is now disposing of its waste catalyst to recently established wasterecycling companies for export “to companies abroad for metal recovery and finaltreatment” [SH&E 2005: 7]. This has reduced <strong>the</strong> refinery’s toxic waste from 4,000to 880 tonnes a year. In so far as <strong>the</strong> metals are recovered, this is likely to result from<strong>the</strong> commodity boom creating high metal prices. A sharp drop in metal markets, as isnow happening, may collapse such enterprises and so return <strong>the</strong> problem to Sasol – orleave it at sea. It should also be recalled that toxic metal recovery has a poor record aswas demonstrated at Thor Chemicals [see Chapter 3]. The problem of toxic waste may<strong>the</strong>refore be transferred to <strong>the</strong> workers in <strong>the</strong> foreign metal recovery factories. Given<strong>the</strong> documented experience of IT recycling, if <strong>the</strong> destination is ano<strong>the</strong>r Sou<strong>the</strong>rncountry it is possible that a proportion of <strong>the</strong> waste is simply dumped on arrival.- 106 - groundWork - <strong>Wasting</strong> <strong>the</strong> <strong>Nation</strong>