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- Residents in Kuils River, Cape Town, are fearful a steel mill operating close to their homes will once again prove to be a health hazard.
- An independent study commissioned by residents during the mill’s operations under previous owners found “exposure to heavy metals”.
- The mill started operating again last month after new owners bought the business.
Kuils River residents are fearful their health and safety will once again be threatened by the actions of big business and the government following the resumption of activity at a steel mill near the Cape Town suburb.
In 2019, a City of Cape Town air quality officer described the lack of a buffer zone between the steel mill and the Kuils River community as a “land-use planning disaster”.
And residents claimed they were again facing serious noise and air pollution threats after the steel mill rumbled back into operation last month, this time under the ownership of the Cape Town Iron and Steel Company (CISCO).
The mill stood idle from 2019 until last month.
Its previous owners – Turkish brothers Dagestan, Hakan and Oguzhan Turanli – abandoned the business three years ago.
They allegedly left behind tons of toxic furnace dust, which the company had neglected to contain and store in compliance with environmental regulations, according to eyewitnesses and minutes of a meeting quoting senior management.
This poor storage left the dust exposed to being blown into the Kuils River community.
The Turnali brothers also left behind an unpaid loan to the state-owned Industrial Development Corporation (IDC).
The IDC put the company into business rescue and, according to the business rescue plan, recovered R225 million from the sale of the steel mill to the Tanzanian Kamal Group owned by brothers Gagan and Malay Gupta, and Jay Thirupathi.
The company was renamed Kamal-CISCO and had to deal with the tons of toxic furnace dust left exposed.
The IDC has declined to comment on the matter.
Medical ailments
Residents believe the toxic dust could be one of the causes of the medical ailments they have experienced in recent years, including headaches, nosebleeds, sinus issues and insomnia.
The City declined to explain or respond to the characterisation of the mill’s location as a “land-planning disaster”.
The metro’s mayoral committee member for community service and health, Patricia van der Ross, claimed the company had complied with all the atmospheric emissions licence (AEL) requirements.
If the AEL requirements are met, the company is permitted to release emissions from the steel mill.
Residents are unconvinced as the steel mill rumbled back into operation last week after a respite of two years and five months.
Resident Stacy de Wet said her son had developed asthma when the plant was last operational, but “that has since mysteriously disappeared”.
“Now the fumes are back, and my instincts tell me they will only get worse. It smells like burning chemicals, metal and debris,” De Wet added.
After just a few days of operation, we have runny noses, sore throats, sinuses and headaches, but none of us are sick. And when I sit relaxing with my headphones on in the evening, I can still hear the noise from the plant over my headphones; it’s a constant grinding noise.
Other residents reported similar complaints.
“A few nights ago, my son went to the bathroom and suddenly started coughing. My wife went to see if he was OK, and she could smell the fumes in the bathroom,” said Leon Thornton.
“This was a daily occurrence [between 2017 and 2019], so it seems this is a continuation of where we left off in 2019.”
Thornton recently submitted a complaint to CISCO and the City’s air quality office.
The complaint read: “There have been a few instances the past week where we have had a very strong chemical smell [metal, plastic burning smell] coming from CISCO, as well as a very loud droning noise.”
Another resident, Earl Polman, also submitted a complaint last month, reporting “the smell coming from CISCO was overwhelming”.
“We were locked inside our home because the smell was overwhelming and very sensitive to our throats. What is being done to curb what seems like a continuation of previous years? Please can we, the community affected by these incidents, be informed what mitigating efforts will be made to avoid this,” he pleaded.
In an emailed response to News24, Polman said he would “not be happy if they operate under the same conditions and same AEL. The City has not changed anything, and the AEL is still a flawed process”.
CISCO’s environmental officer, Gerald Vrolick, confirmed he was aware of some complaints but refused to confirm the number and nature of the complaints.
He did not respond to the claims raised by the residents.
Residents suspect the scrap metal being fed into the arc-electric furnace has not been properly “cleaned” of the paint, plastic and other contaminants being burnt in the smelting process.
They have previously witnessed palls of smoke hanging over the roof of the steel plant, which they believe is leaking the fumes being produced inside, and also suspect the fume plants, which are supposed to extract the toxic fumes from the atmospheric emissions, are inadequate.
Residents collected their own dust samples from March 2018 to March 2019 for analysis. The results confirmed high levels of heavy metals.
A study conducted by the SA Medical Research Council in November 2020 found high levels of arsenic and zinc in soil samples taken from a number of pre-schools within five kilometres of the steel mill.
News24 has seen a report of the study, which looked at 34 pre-schools.
The report reads:
This study provides evidence of exposure to heavy metals in a vulnerable group – pre-school children. Metal concentrations in soil samples were below the South African reference levels; at certain pre-schools, arsenic and zinc concentrations were found to exceed Canadian soil reference levels.
The crux of the problem appears to be the zoning and development of the residential areas around the steel mill without a buffer zone during the period between the mill’s closure by Murray & Roberts in 2010 to the subsequent sale and restarting of the mill by the Turkish owners in 2017.
The “land-use planning disaster” comment by Gildenhys was in response to a resident who, in March 2019, suggested a buffer zone should have been created around the steel mill.
The full comment by Gildenhys read: “Regarding Buffer Zones, I couldn’t agree with you more. As Air Quality Management, we are now expected to solve a Land-use Planning disaster which is not of our making…”
A technical assessment in the City’s Tygerberg District Plan of 2012 stated: “As development has taken place around it, the steelworks has become a nuisance industry … Residential and office development is not viewed as appropriate.”
A similar draft technical report, dated March 2021, recommended that “no activity or use which includes the onsite storage of hazardous substances shall be permitted unless a risk management and prevention plan has been submitted and council has given approval thereto”.
When asked for the risk management and prevention plan Van der Ross referred News24 to CISCO.
The same draft report stated: “Any development east of Kuils River Industria should firstly consult city environmental health to ensure the potential impacts are mitigated through, e.g. determining of appropriate buffer zones in accordance with noise and dust impact assessments.”
The City had no comment regarding the recommendation of its own report.
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