MechChem Africa May 2017

MechChem Africa

•

May 2017

Water distress

and our distracted response

t the time of writing, the Constitutional

Court is hearing arguments about the ‘se-

crecy’ of the vote of no confidence against

Jacob Zuma; Brian Molefe has being reap-

pointed as Eskom, CEO; and, in spite of the brakes

being applied to the nuclear procurement programme

by the Western Cape High Court – because of a lack

of due process – African Utility Week in Cape Town

is expected to be dominated by the nuclear debate.

These issues, along with radical economic trans-

formation, the threat of a third downgrade to ‘junk

status’ byMoody’s and thedivisivenatureof theANC’s

presidential succession campaigns, are so dominant

that the importance of environmental issues are being

downgraded to ‘trivial’.

At SAIChE’sGauteng dinner late lastmonth, a stal-

wart in the environmental space, Mariette Liefferink,

presented an overview of the state of South Africa’s

water, with particular emphasis on the effects of min-

ing. Liefferink’s legal background and the litigation ex-

perienceof theorganisationshe leads – theFederation

for a Sustainable Environment (FSE) –were evident in

themeticulous referencingandcredits associatedwith

every fact she presented.

These are sobering, if not chilling and

MechChem

Africa’s

summaryof her talk is a ‘must read’ in this issue.

Froma water availability perspective, 12 of South

Africa’s 19 Water Management Areas (WMAs)

require intervention, based on a detailed map pre-

sented courtesy of Fred van Zyl, chief engineer for

macro planning for the Department of Water and

Sanitation (DWS).

An online report of a briefing to Ministers by the

DWS on its Infrastructure Master Plan, dated 3 June

2015, reports that

‘… the total estimated replacement

cost (of water infrastructure) was R1.18-billion, and the

estimated investment requirement over ten years was

R805-billion, or R81-billion per annum. The total funding

available was R46-billion per annum, meaning there was

a funding deficit of R35-billion per annum’

[ref: pmg.org.

za/committee-meeting/21011/].

A little further down in the summary, we read:

‘…

DWS was dealing with a backlog of over 100 years in the

making, and to eradicate it in 21 years was impossible,

with the changing urban landscape, the mushrooming of

informal settlements and the increase in urbanmigration’

This report predates the first appointment of Brian

Molefe as the permanent CEO of Eskom (Sep 25,

2015) to ‘sort out’ our load shedding issues. Have any

equivalent appointments or interventions been taken

since to resolve SA’s water distress issues?

The key focus for Liefferink at the FSE is the min-

ing industry and its impacts on the environment, most

notably,water pollutionandacidminedrainage(AMD).

She points out early in her presentation that minewa-

ter acidity as a phenomenon associatedwith pumping

water from pits was already recognised back in 1903.

And 20 years ago in 1987, the US Environmental

ProtectionAgency recognised that

“... problems related

to mining waste may be rated as second only to global

warming and stratospheric ozone depletion in terms of

ecological risk.”

Under the ‘polluter pays’ principle, the historical

knowledge of the AMD problem should put the repa-

ration responsibility back onto themining companies.

But the nature of the problem is such that it manifests

most dangerously after a mine has been shut down.

Manyof theoriginalmineowners areno longer inbusi-

ness and, while current owners are more responsible,

most of the treatment costs are still beingborneby the

public purse and water end-users.

Quoting published reports by the Department

of Water Affairs and Forestry from 2003 and 2006,

(DWAF), Liefferink says:

“… mine void water exceeds

the maximum allowable limits (Class II) of the SABS 241

DrinkingWater Standard, inmany cases by several orders

of magnitude: pH, EC, TDS, SO

, Fe, Mg, Ca, Mn, Al, BP, Co

and Ni”

. Much of the water is also radioactive.

It is currently acceptable to treat AMD by neu-

tralisation or pHadjustment. In this process, dissolved

metals precipitate out of solution in the formof highly

toxic sludge, which is oftenbeing ‘contained’ inunlined

pits, where future ingress risks remain.

In addition, the pH-adjusted water contains sig-

nificant percentages of dissolved salts, so the treated

water requires dilution using purer and more expen-

sive resources inorder tomake it safe. Hence the need

to adopt more modern and more expensive reverse

osmosis or ion exchange treatment technologies.

The treatment costs, as quoted by the May 2016

Long Term Treatment of AMD document, estimated

thecapex cost tobe in the regionofR10- toR12-billion,

withongoingopexcostsofR25-millionpermonth,with

at least 33% being borne by the public.

South Africa is, undoubtedly, faced with multiple

imperatives.Water,however,alreadyunderfundedand

poorly prioritised, is being dangerously neglected due

to the prevailing noise.

MechChem Africa

is endorsed by:

Peter Middleton