Kaohsiung City Government's promise to clear away furnace slag has gone unfulfilled for seven years, leaving Qishan with nowhere to put the waste

General News Jan 1, 1970 0 views

Is the Kaohsiung City Government's promise to clear away furnace slag all a lie? After seven years of waiting, there was only a second of joy, and a vast amount of waste remains in Qishan with nowhere to go

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More than a million tonnes of China Steel basic oxygen furnace (BOF) slag and unidentified waste were buried by people on farmland in Dalin Village, Qishan District, Kaohsiung, and nearly seven years have passed since then. Last month, on March 26, the Kaohsiung City Environmental Protection Bureau finally took a key first step, joining one of the companies that originally buried the waste, Wandah Material Technology Co., in publicly promising: "We will absolutely not remove only the BOF slag. Even if what we dig up today turns out to be more than 990,000 tonnes, we will still clear everything out."

Two weeks later, Wandah conducted its first hauling operation at 10 a.m. on April 8. The moment the excavator started up, Zheng Miaozhen, chairwoman of the Dalin Village Anti-Furnace Slag Self-Rescue Association, said emotionally: "We have waited and waited, and finally we have seen that first scoop dug out!" Yet after supervising the site for one hour, Zheng Miaozhen's dream shattered.

She discovered that Wandah had no intention of hauling all the waste away, and was willing only to take the BOF slag to the Dafa Industrial Zone in Daliao for temporary storage. She said bitterly, "Taking away only the BOF slag and leaving the other unidentified waste in the main backfill area - today we came to endorse the Environmental Protection Bureau, endorse what? Endorse a slap in the face, endorse being deceived."

This pit, 2.5 m wide, 8 m long and about 1.3 m high, was the first step in clearing the Qishan Dalin BOF slag burial site. (Photo / Li Huiyi)

Kaohsiung City Councilor Qiu Yuxuan, who received an urgent petition from residents, also rushed to the excavation site in Dalin Village on the afternoon of the 8th and demanded an immediate halt to work. She said: "I want to defend my constituency, and I don't want secondary pollution, because I don't know what the company will haul to Daliao."

The sad fate of Dalin farmland: unscrupulous operators used BOF slag under the guise of a product to smuggle in unidentified waste for burial

The farmland at the center of the controversy lies in the Dalin section of Qishan, within the water quality and water quantity protection area in the upper reaches of the Gaoping River. The soil is fertile and the water clean, yet it has had a tragic history. This farmland was first illegally mined for sand and gravel in 1996, leaving pits of various sizes covering a total area of 5.2 to 7 hectares and more than 20 m deep. Then in May 2013, unscrupulous operators buried 990,000 tonnes of China Steel BOF slag and an incalculable amount of unidentified waste there.

BOF slag is a byproduct produced when China Steel Corporation makes steel. CHC Resources is a subsidiary of China Steel responsible for using BOF slag in road construction, marine or civil engineering. However, CHC Resources did not sell these 990,000 tonnes of BOF slag as a "product." Instead, it sold them to Wandah at the low price of 5 yuan per tonne and also subsidized the hauling cost at 220 yuan per tonne. Wandah, in turn, sold them to Jianfa Company (which was also the landowner) at 5 yuan per tonne, while the subsidized hauling cost was 40 to 45 yuan per tonne.

Zheng Miaozhen, chairwoman of the Dalin Village Anti-Waste Furnace Slag Self-Rescue Association, said the operators originally buried not only China Steel BOF slag, because BOF slag had the name of a "product" and could legally shield the illegal, which gave the operators the chance to smuggle in other unidentified waste. Wang Zhongyi, chairman of the Zunhuai Culture and Education Foundation, said: "On paper it is said there are 990,000 tonnes, but there is even more other unidentified or toxic waste in the farmland."

BOF slag has been buried in the farmland for nearly seven years without seeing the light of day. Will excavation dig up hope or despair? (Photo / Li Huiyi)

The Environmental Protection Bureau approved the operator's clearance plan and promised completion within three years, but excavation revealed layer upon layer of difficulty

After nearly seven years of oversight, reporting, petitions and protests, and with cooperation among civic groups including the Dalin Village Anti-Waste Furnace Slag Self-Rescue Association, the Zunhuai Culture and Education Foundation, the Tainan Community University and the Citizens of the Earth Foundation, Dalin farmland finally showed signs of life.

On March 26, 2020, the Kaohsiung City Environmental Protection Bureau joined one of the operators, Wandah, in holding a briefing and publicly promised to complete the clearance within three years. On April 8, Wandah chose the Dalin section plot No. 512, on the connecting road previously used by trucks hauling BOF slag, for the first excavation work.

Qishan residents had waited a long time for this day! In a joint media interview, Zheng Miaozhen, chairwoman of the Dalin Village Anti-Waste Furnace Slag Self-Rescue Association, said: "I am very moved, but I can only be happy for one second, because the oversight over the next three years is what matters most." But Zheng Miaozhen never imagined that she really would be happy for only one second!

While supervising the work, Zheng Miaozhen discovered that Wandah was not following the Environmental Protection Bureau's promise made on the day of the briefing to haul all the waste away. It was willing only, after excavation and testing, to haul BOF slag that passed testing to the Dafa Industrial Zone in Daliao for temporary storage.

The main BOF slag backfill site covers more than five hectares, and there is great uncertainty. At present, the operator first excavated the connecting road that trucks carrying BOF slag used earlier, and this connecting road was paved with BOF slag. (Photo / Li Huiyi)

Zheng Miaozhen poured out her grievances to Environmental Protection Bureau personnel on site: "At that briefing that day, the deputy director-general vowed that everything would be dug out clean, and we endorsed it happily, and the city councilor also endorsed it happily. You let Wandah handle only the BOF slag and leave the unidentified waste to the perpetrator (Jianfa Company). Don't you know that this is just like before, leaving residents to face the problem themselves? How scared are we?"

Environmental Protection Bureau personnel tried to reassure Zheng Miaozhen: "Look at it another way. At least the cleanup has started, and we have taken the lawsuit all the way to the Supreme Court and are fighting them (Jianfa Company) in court too! Alas! What we worry about is whether we can even get into the Daliao site. That is still a question!"