Pretoria - The decision by National Air Quality Officer Dr Thulie Mdluli to approve or deny Eskom’s application for
long-term postponements from complying with air quality legislation is critically important, according to Greenpeace.
That is why Greenpeace activists, together with community members from the coalfields around Witbank (Emalahleni), on Thursday rolled out a green carpet outside the department of environmental affairs to urge the National Air Quality Officer to reject Eskom’s application for long-term postponements from complying with air quality legislation.
The activists also constructed a wall of boxes containing the names of over 25 000 people who added their voices to the Greenpeace petition calling for Eskom’s application to be denied.
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"Greenpeace calls on Dr Mdluli to do the right thing, and turn down Eskom’s application, thereby protecting people’s health and holding one of South Africa’s mega-polluters accountable,” said Michael O’Brien-Onyeka, executive director of Greenpeace Africa.
He said research has indicated that if Eskom’s coal power stations do not comply with the Minimum Emission Standards, this will cause 20 000 premature deaths.
"Eskom has applied for long-term postponements from complying with these minimum standards, which will apply to almost all of its coal power stations. If this application is approved, thousands of people in the coalfields will continue to bear the health burden of living in the shadows of coal power stations," said O’Brien-Onyeka.
“We see Eskom’s application as a disgrace, because they knew since 2010 that they had to meet the standards, but they ignored this. So now that they see that the time has come to comply, they want more time so that they can continue to pollute."
Emalahleni has 12 Eskom power stations.
"For us, Eskom is taking advantage of poor communities and this is not something that we want to allow. The law should be above everyone and if the government does not take this into consideration then it simply means that if you have money, like Eskom, you can violate our constitutional rights,” said Nomcebo Makhubelo from the Mpumalanga Youth Against Climate Change group.
“We are urging the National Air Quality Officer to put people before profit. The reality is that coal kills and the true cost of coal is destruction at every step. Eskom is essentially asking for a free ticket to pollute and kill and we think that the answer should be a clear ‘o’. At least existing coal power stations should comply with the Minimum Emission Standards, which are still lower than those recommended by the World Health Organisation,” added O’Brien-Onyeka.
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