Dire: Sasol has been allowed, for years, to exceed the minimum emission standards despite sulpher dioxide and other pollutants contributing to ill-health and death. Photo: Waldo Swiegers/Getty Images
Samson Mokoena was in his late 20s when South Africa’s first air pollution hotspot — the Vaal Triangle Airshed Priority Area — was declared in 2006.
Since then the Vaal Triangle has remained a “sacrifice zone” for its residents, who are subjected to dangerous levels of air pollution, said Mokoena, the coordinator of the Vaal Environmental Justice Alliance (Veja).
“The Vaal Triangle was one of the three declared priority areas and … yet we see companies like Sasol, ArcelorMittal and Eskom not continuously investing in their operations, but who continuously want to bypass the legislation,” he said. “There’s been no action whatsoever to improve air quality since the declaration.”
Veja is part of the Life After Coal campaign, which has condemned last month’s decision by Barbara Creecy, the forestry, fisheries and environment minister, to allow Sasol “further leniency in relation to its toxic air pollution”.
She granted Sasol’s air quality-related appeal, allowing it to measure emissions of sulphur dioxide (SO2) from the 17 coal-fired boilers at its Secunda operations “in the way that Sasol prefers — although with certain conditions”, the campaign said.
Sasol’s latest appeal was against the July 2023 decision of the National Air Quality Officer, which refused Sasol’s application for “alternative limits” for its SO2 emissions.
Creecy’s decision will cause premature deaths and elevated illnesses in already heavily polluted areas of the Mpumalanga Highveld and the Vaal, when compared with compliance with the minimum emission standards (MES), the campaign said.
“The decision that the minister has taken to exempt these companies, especially Sasol, ArcelorMittal and Eskom, is unacceptable in terms of our democratic values,” Mokoena added. “Section 24 of the Constitution guarantees that everyone has the right to an environment that is not harmful to our health and well-being.”
The Life After Coal campaign consists of groundWork, Earthlife Africa, the Centre for Environmental Rights, Vukani Environmental Justice Movement and the South Durban Community Environmental Alliance.
They have also denounced the lack of transparency surrounding Creecy’s decision, demanding the immediate release of all expert reports and legal advice taken into account by the National Environmental Consultative and Advisory Forum (Neca) in making its recommendation to the minister and by her in making her appeal decision.
“Sasol is a major polluter, emitting some 167 kilotonnes of sulphur dioxide from its industrial processes every year,” according to the campaign.
“It emits several other dangerous pollutants and is a major contributor to the toxic air quality on the Mpumalanga Highveld, which has been held to violate the constitutional right to a healthy environment.”
It has been well documented that exposure to excess SO2 causes an increased risk of lower respiratory infections, increased risk of stroke and increased risk of death from diabetes. “Studies also show severe health impacts on children, the elderly, pregnant women, and those already suffering from asthma and heart and lung disease.”
Mokoena further noted: “If you go to Sebokeng Hospital, especially in winter, you find elderly people and children flocking into public health institutions — clinics and hospitals — because of the high levels of air pollution in the region. And people live under poverty and inequality.
“We see the minister not enforcing the law but allowing these companies to be given these exemptions.”
The minimum emission standards were promulgated in 2010 after a multi-year consultative process, which included major industrial emitters such as Sasol, under the Air Quality Act. They are intended to regulate activities that have a significantly detrimental effect on human health.
The campaign said that although it is better to have legislated standards than to not have them, the country’s minimum emission standards for various pollutants are weaker than those even in other developing countries.
South Africa’s sulpher dioxide MES are about 10 times weaker than the standards in India and about 28 times weaker than those in China.
Despite participating in the setting of the minimum emission standards for the five years preceding their promulgation in 2010, Sasol has “consistently acted to undermine these standards and to avoid MES compliance”.
Just Share, the activist shareholder group, opposed the appeal. It provided expert evidence that MES compliance would reduce premature deaths and harm to health by 40% to 60%.
Sasol’s proposed limit, even by April 2030, would reduce these effects by only 5% considering Sasol’s 2022-23 emissions, Just Share said. Granting Sasol’s appeal would result in 50% to 130% higher harmful effects than MES compliance.
“This decision means that the government has permitted a private company to set its own pollution limits, making a mockery of pollution laws and constitutional rights, and of any claim by the government to take public health seriously,” Just Share said.
According to the campaign, this “compliance avoidance trend” — through emitters repeatedly applying to postpone MES compliance and for weaker alternative emission limits, and the department of forestry, fisheries and the environment “granting this leniency” — have contributed to a failure to improve air quality, as well as the erosion of air quality laws.
Mafoko Phomane, a senior environmental health campaigner and public health specialist at groundWork, said: “The minister’s decision allows for communities to continuously be exposed to excess sulpher dioxide and we know that it causes increased lower respiratory infections, and increased risk of stroke, as well as premature death.
“Realising that the minister’s decision almost ignores what’s happening on the ground is disheartening,” she said, noting that Sasol has been consistently trying to evade compliance with the minimum emission standards.
Creecy said in her decision, that she considered with “utmost seriousness” the potential negative health effects associated with Sasol’s non-compliance with the MES. “I am aware that in the current economic climate, the country is plagued by high unemployment and poverty rates. It is not in dispute that the appellant [Sasol] provides strategic contributions to the country’s economy.
“This does not mean that I condone that the appellant continues operating under a postponement of the MES new plant standards or corresponding limit. I concur with the Neca Forum’s recommendation that the appellant must ensure that it plays an integral role in improving ambient air quality and decarbonising, in line with South Africa’s commitments.”
She said she shared the concerns of the National Air Quality Officer and Just Share that Sasol “has had many years within which to comply with the MES, which it has failed to do”.
“Like the Neca Forum, I also share the concern raised by the National Air Quality Officer and the interested and affected party regarding the health risks associated with the occasional but very high exceedances of SO2.
“To mitigate against the health risks, the Neca Forum has recommended the additional measure of an accompanying concentration limit of 1 400mg/Nm3 [normal cubic metre] for the appellant’s SO2 emissions, which is substantially below existing plant standards, but still a feasible target according to the appellant’s own projections.”
Mokoena said the government has allowed itself to be bullied by these industries in terms of the minimum emission standards that they must comply with because of the “jobs issue”.
“One of the things that these companies are saying is that if they comply with the air quality standards, they will have to shut down and people will lose jobs. So they’ve been hiding around the whole question of jobs because they know people are desperate for jobs. Now, air quality can come secondary.”
Sasol said it is committed to operate within legal requirements and “that Sasol complies with our atmospheric emission licences”.
To ensure continued operations, within legal requirements from
1 April 2025, Sasol submitted an application in terms of Clause 12A of the minimum emission standards.
“Clause 12A does not seek to obtain leniency in air quality emissions compliance but rather to regulate our emissions on an alternative basis (load-based instead of concentration-based).
“Sasol’s proposal involves emissions reductions in an integrated manner, which will achieve double the reductions in SO2 emissions (load-based) than would have been achieved when compared to, and the equivalent mass reduction associated with, the MES concentration limit. In addition, there will be further reductions in particulate matter and nitrogen oxides on a load-basis.”
Sasol said these further reductions will result in an improvement of ambient air quality in the Vaal Triangle above minimum emission standards compliance. “This solution is aligned with Sasol’s stated ambition to decarbonise and transition to sustainable feedstocks. Sasol believes that the minister acknowledged these aspects in her decision of 5 April 2024.”