Blog entry

Western Balkans holds breath for better air quality

This article first appeared on Euractiv.com.

Europe has long been grappling with air pollution but after twenty years of joint efforts EU citizens can gradually breathe more easily.

In the Western Balkans, however, the situation is far worse. Every year, thousands of people in countries bordering the EU get sick or die prematurely due to air pollution, but even reliable data on air pollutants is hard to come by.

The authorities’ approach to the problem has been so poor that some communities who neighbour power plants and mines are now asking to be relocated.

Over the past eight months Bankwatch has been monitoring dust pollution in communities across the region, and the incredibly terrible levels we have recorded clarify that this is nothing short of a crisis.

The EU, which is regularly working with Western Balkan governments to upgrade their energy and environmental policies, has an important role to play.

People in Macedonia, Montenegro and Bosnia-Herzegovina have already taken to the streets to protest the polluted air they are made to breathe. They pay with their health for unchecked air pollution from traffic, household heating and electricity generation.

In fact, the most recent EEA air quality report, using 2013 data, estimated that PM 2.5 pollution alone kills 18,310 people in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia and Macedonia every year.

So, everybody knows the situation is bad. But the findings from our air quality measurements in communities in four countries in the Western Balkans, and in Bulgaria and Romania have astonished even us.

What all these communities have in common is that they are home to ageing coal power plants and open-cast lignite mines, which play an important role in aggravating air quality. Worryingly enough, governments are nowadays promoting plans to build even more coal units in most of these towns.

In the first ever independent air quality monitoring in these places, we wanted to assess the levels of particulate matter (PM) pollution. Our results indicated disturbingly high levels of both PM 10 and PM 2.5.

In Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina, we found high peaks during night time. Air pollution levels skyrocketing as soon as it gets dark, after 19:00 local time, suggest that the pollution filters at the Tuzla power plant, the main source of air pollution, might not function properly or are even turned off during night time.

PM 10 hourly concentrations at night were on many occasions above 100 micrograms/cubic metre including some values above 300, while the day time concentrations were on average in line with the EU and WHO recommended limit of 50 µg/m³ per 24 hours.

Meanwhile, in Serbia, the law stipulates that the PM 10 limit may be breached in no more than on 35 days over the course of one year, just like in the EU’s Air Quality Directive limits. But over just 30 days of our measurements in the village of Drmno, the legal limit for the daily average for PM 10 was breached on 16 days.

The same limit for PM 10 daily average was breached on 21 of the 35 days observed in Pljevlja, Montenegro, while the EU limit for PM 2.5 was exceeded on 29 of the 35 days observed, or 83% of the time.

In Bitola, Macedonia, pollution levels were so high that after only a few days the machine’s filters and measurement chamber were contaminated and it had to be sent for clean-up and re-calibration.

Across the board, people from the local communities we have visited while performing the air quality measurements all said the situation is so desperate the only way for them to protect their health is to relocate their communities.

But where would they all move? And who can guarantee that the air would be better in the next location in the absence of air quality regulations in all contributing sectors – energy, mining, industry, transport and household heating?

Accurate, regular and publicly available air quality data is a crucial condition for tackling the problem. It is questionable why the responsible authorities, such as the local environmental inspections or agencies, do not prioritise such locations when placing the official monitoring stations.

Both types of PM should be attentively monitored, but much greater stress should be put on PM 2.5 which is the more harmful of the two, as PM 2.5 particles are lighter and go deeper into the lungs, causing greater long-term damage. They also stay in the air longer, for days or weeks, and travel farther – up to a few hundred kilometres.

In the EU, it seems, not a season goes by without hearing of an infringement procedure on the topic of air pollution. In April, the European Court of Justice ruled against Bulgaria for failing to stay within the allowed PM 10 limits and for failing to take action to keep the exceedance period as short as possible.

Just last week, Romania received a letter of formal notice for failing to ensure proper monitoring of air quality throughout the country.

But the paradox of air pollution is that while its sources are easy to identify and locate – such as open-cast lignite mines or ash disposal sites – exposure to pollution, and particularly to fine dust particles, is not a location-specific problem.

Pollutants travel for hundreds of kilometres and affect neighbouring communities and countries as well. As a result, pollution from coal power plants in the Western Balkans affects, not only its adjacent communities, but also those in neighbouring EU countries.

Although European air quality is projected to improve in the future, further efforts to reduce emissions of air pollutants are urgently needed in the EU’s immediate neighbours in the Western Balkans.

All countries in the region have air pollution legislation, albeit with much variation and often much more lenient than EU standards. But the issue of air pollution requires a regional response. The Energy Community, the body tasked with adjusting energy policies in Europe’s south east to those in the EU, is also where a coordinated action to tackle air pollution can be devised.

What this region needs is a long term vision that prioritises carbon-free energy generation sectors across the region, putting energy efficiency first, cleaner or alternative fuels for all modes of transportation, and strict enforcement of air quality standards.

And it is where the Energy Community Treaty can play a pivotal role in setting the tone for a level playing field and bringing forth joint efforts to tackle the problem through timely and strict monitoring of implementation and enforcement of air quality legislation.

Women and hydropower: exacerbating vulnerability without resettlement

One of the development phraseologies du jour is ‘sustainable and inclusive growth’, often used to mask the impacts of a pending piece of large infrastructure on socially-vulnerably groups. In the case of the Nenskra hydropower plant in Georgia’s Svaneti region, it has become a favourite trope for the public banks considering the project – the European Investment Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, the Korean Development Bank and SACE, the Italian export credit agency – to downplay the serious threats Nenskra poses, particularly on women.

The project will affect two small gorges in the villages of Chuberi and Nakra, which are home to roughly 1200 people. The environmental and social impact assessment concludes that only 80 households will be directly impacted by the dam – with no specific and disproportionate impacts regarding gender – and it boasts that all members of these communities will enjoy social programmes provided by the project sponsor.

The project sponsor, Korean K Water, has said that it would source employment for all of the unskilled and half of the skilled workers from the villages in and around Svaneti, in order to minimize an influx of employment migrants, like the expected 1100 workers needed for construction, most assuredly to be male. As the World Commission on Dams warned, “large dam projects typically build on the imbalance in existing gender relations. For affected communities dams have widened gender disparities either by imposing a disproportionate share of social costs on women or through an inequitable allocation of the benefits generated”. Some of these wider impacts may include domestic violence and sexually transmitted diseases, and problems during land compensation when planning is poor and gender-blind. This is because gender and power imbalances lead to the further marginalization of women in traditional land ownership societies.

Women from Chuberi and Nakra shared their experiences with this sort of mistreatment. Said one woman doctor in Chuberi about consultation processes over the Nenskra project, “They don’t take into account anybody’s comments and proposals, and they could not answer concrete questions about the risks we face.” Another woman working as a teacher in Chuberi echoed these sentiments. “When I find out that there is a meeting planned, I always go there and often see bizarre situations. Often I film the meetings and meeting organizers and police try to stop me, claiming that filming a public meeting is illegal.” Women here also fear that in the future they may be forced to resettle, which would worsen the quality of life because of the risks posed to health and the potential for geological accidents. [1]

Their fears have precedent, as other hydropower projects in Georgia financed by the development banks have shown. In the Adjara mountains of the southwest, the Shuakhevi project jointly financed by the ADB and the EBRD was said to have no impacts on gender.

Yet the Adjara mountains are inhabited by primarily Muslim communities, whose religious beliefs and social and cultural specificities mean that project consultations affect genders differently. For example, during public hearings with three villages affected by the project, only men were present at the meetings (pdf), and not a single woman had been interviewed even separately. The project sponsor, Norwegian Clean Water, decided not to confront a local man who claimed that “woman cannot express their opinions freely”.

Increased traffic and blasting from the construction have also impacted the lives of women in more than ten communities in the region. They now must accompany children to and from school, and women are travelling further to retrieve water for household use, sometimes two to three kilometres more, as river and springs nearby have dried up. In addition, women whose spouses or relatives find jobs on construction now have a greater workload, since they then need to maintain the agricultural activities previously cared for by men.

The fights of women against the hydropower need more support from civil society groups working on gender issues. Issues like positive discrimination and quotas in parliament can be strengthened and support local battles for public participation in decision-making and increased involvement of women in politics.

Notes

1. According to the 2016 ESIA “Its impact on climate will be essential in spring, when the whole ice cover will start melting-breaking and in the late autumn, before the ice events will start. The significant difference between water and air temperature in these periods and strong wind will activate evaporation. Evaporated moisture in form of snow-ice will lie on buildings, fruit trees and will damage them. The damage caused by early freezes is heavier, because the freezes cause the death of buds and sprouts, due to which the useful plants start premature aging, infertility and death. The population living in the vicinity of the reservoir will get a heavy living conditions, who are sick with rheumatism or/and respiratory and require vascular system treatment.”

What will it take to make Balkan leaders realise new coal plants are a liability, not a gold mine?

This article first appeared in Balkan Green Energy News.

In April this year, the EU proved that whatever difficulties it might be going through, it can still make momentous decisions. It approved new pollution control standards for power stations, entitled the LCP BREF (1) The name might sound obscure, but the results should be concrete: The new standards are projected to save up to 20 000 lives annually across the EU.

On the EU’s doorstep in the Western Balkans, however, you would hardly know the LCP BREF existed. Almost all the countries in the region are planning to build new coal power plants, and there has been virtually no mention of the need for them to comply with the new standards.

This is strange, because not only is compliance with the new LCP BREF necessary for EU accession, but most Western Balkans already stipulate it as part of their domestic pollution control legislation (2). This means that as soon as the standards enter force in the EU this year, they also enter into force in most of the region.

CO2 remains an unsolvable problem with coal

Let’s be clear here: the LCP BREF is not a panacea. It limits emissions of SO2, NOx, PM10, HCl, HF and mercury, so it makes a great contribution to reducing coal’s health impacts. But it can’t do anything about the biggest problem with coal: CO2 and its contribution to climate change. There is no filter that can stop CO2 emissions, and if we are to limit climate change to 1.5-2 degrees, no new coal plants can be built. Unlike climate science, BREF is legally binding, and attempts to ignore it will likely backfire even sooner than attempts to ignore climate science.

Legislative changes need to be anticipated

Whether you have to comply with the LCP BREF right now or in a few years, it’s not something you want to ignore. With power stations lasting 40 years and more, they need to be designed in line with the very latest technical and environmental standards, and their promoters need to anticipate the rules coming up within the next few years. Failure to do so means additional and potentially expensive retrofits just a couple of years after a plant has opened.

With the chances of new coal plants being viable already at rock bottom, such additional costs could easily increase the risk of stranded assets. Only very few EU countries are planning new coal plants, because of low electricity prices, the growth of renewable energy, CO2 costs, and pollution control legislation that is gradually making polluters, instead of the public, pay the health costs of coal.

Yet governments and utilities in the Western Balkans are not doing their homework about recent trends and new legislation that awaits them in the next few years, with the result that their planned projects are dangerously out of date.

Earlier this year we revealed that none of the planned coal power plants seem to have properly taken the costs of CO2 into account in their financial planning. Now we’ve crunched the numbers for the LCP BREF and found that none of the plants has proven compliance with the new standards either.

Planned Balkan coal plants not in compliance with new BREF

There are eight units currently being actively planned in the region. Out of these, five would violate the new standards while for three there is insufficient information available. Kostolac B3 in Serbia, Pljevlja II in Montenegro, and the Oslomej reconstruction in Macedonia have been designed in line with the older Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) Annex V standards, but not the new BREF. Tuzla 7 and Banovići in Bosnia-Herzegovina don’t even go this far: Tuzla 7 is bound only by the even more outdated local legislation while the environmental permit for Banovići is unclear about what standards are relevant. For the remaining three units, Ugljevik III units 1 and 2, and Kosova e Re, the information about likely emissions is still unclear.

Kostolac B3 in Serbia is the only plant for which the new BREF has even been mentioned in its official documentation. It is currently undergoing an environmental impact assessment process, in which local groups have commented on the need for the plant to comply with the BREF. The only reaction so far is an amendment in the study stating that the plant would be an existing plant under the BREF and thus allowed to pollute more than new plants. Even if some retrofits are necessary, the study argues, this is a normal procedure after running a plant for a few years, and thus nothing to worry about.

Neither of these claims is true: Any plant receiving its integrated environmental permit after the LCP BREF enters force in the EU is a new one, according to the BREF definitions, and has to stick to the highest standards. As for undertaking retrofits, the study authors should really check the plant’s feasibility assessment, which shows that the plant will be unviable even with a low CO2 price.

The story is not dissimilar with Pljevlja II in Montenegro. Despite being hailed – like all the plants – as being in line with EU standards, it turns out that it is in line only with outdated ones. Local NGOs pointed out during the environmental assessment process that the plant must comply with the new LCP BREF, but they have received no reaction from the authorities as yet.

Montenegro and Serbia may seem like the most alarming cases due to being ahead of others in EU accession, but Bosnia-Herzegovina is if anything a more worrying case, due to the number of projects planned. The Stanari lignite power plant which started commercial operation last September is already out of date compared to the Industrial Emissions Directive and will now be out of line with the BREF as well. If Ugljevik III, Tuzla 7, and Banovići are all completed and all out of line with the BREF, the country will end up with a significant burden on its hands.

If the Balkans electricity utilities really ran on commercial lines, as they are bound by the Energy Community Treaty to do, they would never risk these projects. The new LCP BREF is but one more indicator that coal is an increasing liability, and the Balkan countries should be looking much more carefully at what’s going on around them. After all, the region has ample potential for wind, solar and energy savings combined with a relatively small population, so if this region can’t make a transition to sustainable energy, who can?

NOTES:

Large Combustion Plants Best Available Techniques Reference Document
Albania, the Federation entity of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo Macedonia and Montenegro. Serbia and Republika Srpska both require the application of best available techniques but do not specify that the EU reference document should be used.

Powerline to nowhere: Georgian villages take stand against badly routed transmission lines

Construction on a powerline in Georgia was put on hold one month ago after villagers blocked excavation machinery in the village of Pasanauri. About 150 residents contested the routing, claiming that the project threatens people’s health and safety. The police intervened to halt the May 10 protest, which resulted in the arrest of six.

Touted as a strategic energy project by the Georgian government, the 100 kilometre-long Ksani-Stepantsminda power line is part of a broader transmission corridor extension deal that would connect Georgia with neighbouring countries. The powerline would boost Georgia’s electricity exports and cross-border transmission with Armenia and Russia. But Georgian environmentalists have doubts about Russia’s readiness to trade electricity with its southern neighbor, arguing that Russia has no plans to build connecting lines on its side of the border before 2021. They also argue that the construction of the 500 kV stretch within Georgia has happened without a clearly defined route in mind and proper risk assessment and consultation with the affected villages.

Protests against the high voltage line spread to several villages in the Khando Gorge in the days following the Pasanauri rally. In response to the events, Kakha Kaladze, Georgia’s Minister of Energy, publicly blamed Bankwatch member group Green Alternative for the dissent. Locals and Green Alternative reject the allegations, as villagers say the protest was a spontaneous reaction to the project promoter’s bulldozing over their rights to have a say in the siting of the voltage towers and the size of the buffer corridor. All those arrested at Pasanauri were later released with a GEL 400-600 fine for disobedience, approximately a two month budget for a poor family of four in the mountains.

The Ksani-Stepantsminda powerline is being developed by the state electricity transmission network operator and financed by the German development bank KfW. Green Alternative legally challenged the project’s environmental permit in November last year, claiming that the ministry had rubber stamped it in the absence of a proper routing and risk assessment.

The Ksani-Stepantsminda transmission lines have received the blessings of other international financiers, including the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The EBRD financed the Dariali hydropower plant 70 kilometres north of Pasanauri, which is contested due to significant environmental and natural hazards. The electricity generated by Dariali and other hydropower plants in the Kazbegi region should be transmitted the Ksani-Stepantsminda line. A protest similar to the one in Psanauri over a routing of a powerline connecting the Dariali plant with a substation sparked heated disagreements in the village of Tsdo in May last year.

Doubts about the route of the Ksani-Stepantsminda cropped up in other places like the Sno Gorge. Protests are likely to continue unless the state reviews the route and engages with the affected villages prior to entering with bulldozers.

A Bulgarian oligarch, tax avoidance and a village that tries to move: how Sofia fails to implement EU pollution laws

In the last couple of years I have visited over ten lignite mining regions in the Balkans and spoken to equally as many local communities’ representatives. While for some politicians these places are reasons for nationalist and economic pride, let’s face it: they are not pretty and the people living there do not have the healthiest or most fulfilling lives. But never before did I have such a strong feeling of helplessness and defiance at the same time as I did when in Golemo Selo in Bulgaria.

Home to the 540MW Bobov Dol lignite power plant, coal mines and storages and ash disposal sites, the 600-strong community, located only some 60 km south-west of Sofia, does not have it easy. Fully subordinated to the Bobov Dol municipality, administratively speaking, the village of Golemo Selo basically has no say in the approval of the power plant’s operations, no financial gain and not even many jobs for the local people either.

It’s as if your landlord decided to bring someone into your house, asked for your opinion, and then even though you said you weren’t thrilled, continued to charge you the same rent. Meanwhile the new person dumps their garbage on your balcony and expects you to clean it up.

Sustained pollution triggers response from Brussels

In 2009, the Bobov Dol coal power plant was the second biggest dust or particulate matter (PM10) polluter among all coal capacities in the EU, and has been the main source of stress for the locals of Golemo Selo. On one hand, there’s the black coal dust which comes in big clouds over the narrow streets a few times a day when a coal transporting train is unloaded at the power plant. When the cloud is gone, locals can fill their time with wiping off the limestone white dust emitted by the power plant’s desulphurisation units. This is a routine they perform 5-6 times a day.

The problem of PM10 pollution in Bulgaria is a long and soaring cause of dispute between Brussels and Sofia. The row dates back to 2009, when the European Commission first warned Bulgaria against failure to fulfil its air quality obligations, in particular to keep periods with unhealthy pollution levels as short as possible. In April this year, the European Court of Justice issued the judgement that Bulgaria is still infringing the European legislation on air quality, thus failing to protect the health and well-being of its citizens.

The Court’s ruling notes that “it is apparent from the annual reports on air quality, submitted by Bulgaria from 2008 onwards, that the daily and annual limit values for PM10 concentrations were exceeded systematically and continuously throughout the territory”. (Only one region was an exception to this. It was not Bobov Dol.)

There’s no official air monitoring station in the vicinity of Bobov Dol, but the monitoring device installed by Greenpeace Bulgaria showed continuous breaches of the limits in April.

A graph showing that the PM10 levels in Golemo Selo, Bulgaria, are often breaching the limit set by EU regulations and that on several occasion, the limit has been breached tenfold. — Pollution levels in Golemo Selo regularly exceeded EU limits for PM10 with some extreme peaks according to Greenpeace monitoring in April 2017.

Annex XI to the EU Directive 2008/50 on Ambient Air Quality – entitled ‘Limit values for the protection of human health’ – specifies that a daily level of 50 μg/ m³ for PM10 must not be exceeded more than 35 times a calendar year. The annual limit lies at 40 μg/m³ per day, averaged over one calendar year. Bulgaria passed its deadline for meeting those limit values already in 2007.

Pollution and tax avoidance after privatisation

In 2007 the second unit of the Bobov Dol power plant was taken offline for failing to undertake the necessary investments in modernisation to comply with emissions standards. The locals remember some relief, as there was one unit less emitting the dust that defines their daily routines.

However, the miracle did not last too long: after a disputed privatisation process the Bobov Dol power plant landed in the hands of the controversial oligarch Hristo Kovachki and his consortium Energia MK. In the same year, unit two went back online.

Energia MK registered the Bobov Dol power plant company on the Seychelles, a known tax haven. After a tax-haven restriction law was passed in Bulgaria in 2014 the plant (and other companies connected to Kovachki) reregistered simultaneously under a shell-company address in London. The headquarters are now in a peaceful London district, in an empty house with a dried palm tree in-front.

A street in London. A dry palm tree stands in front of one of the houses. — The London street where Bobov Dol and other companies of Hristo Kovachki are registered now.

Hristo Kovachki himself has been charged with tax fraud in 2009 but has not been convicted. He has been a target of the national revenue agency and of labour authorities a few more times throughout the years.

The locals I have spoken to do not remember a formal consultation procedure before the unit went back online, even though it was required by law. At the time of acquisition, the new owners announced investments in pollution control measures in the amount of 60 million euros. But since then numerous reports of the company bypassing pollution control filters have been filed by locals and by Bulgarian environmental groups.

Locals taking matters into their own hands

These days, Vasil Vasev, the mayor of Golemo Selo is collecting signatures for a referendum, at the end of which the hope is that the village would no longer be in the administration of Bobov Dol municipality, but in that of Dupnitsa, another town just 6 km away. Another hope is that some of the taxes paid by the local community to the higher administrative body would return in the form of local development projects and environmental improvement measures. (

Bulgarian media reported recently that the Bobov Dol municipality would not approve the organisation of the referendum. Some delays caused by legal action are therefore likely before the locals get a chance to vote and finally make their voice heard.

Whatever the results of the referendum, the fact remains that the Bobov Dol power plant is a relic of an obsolete technology, which is a constant source of stress for the local community, contributes greatly to the country’s poor air quality and is in the hands of a tycoon investigated for bypassing the law on numerous occasions.

I do hope the determination of the locals to change the state of affairs will have a domino effect in the country’s long forgotten coal communities and set the direction for a diversified regional development.

Coal dependent regions across Europe are facing a downward trend in coal production and the number of employees in the sector has been dropping constantly, so the time is ripe for putting in place a just transition for these communities.

The worst was yet to come – ludicrous air pollution in Romanian village

The small Romanian village with the poetic-sounding name of Rosia de Jiu was the last leg of our independent dust monitoring tour through the Balkans. After finding some already alarming levels of air pollution in other countries, we were prepared for similar results in Romania. We couldn’t have expected such bad air, though.

You really need a local guide to help you navigate towards to the village of Rosia de Jiu. Well hidden behind a (now illegal) coal storage depot in the town of Rovinari, you have to take a little side street off the main road and have a trained eye to spot the sign towards the village. It’s like a well-hidden secret. That narrow road always reminds me of what they say when you exit an airport “no return beyond this point”. Sadly enough, the approximately 20 families which still live there do often find themselves in a dead end situation.

The village, situated near the existing Rovinari lignite power plant, has been exposed for years to extreme air pollution, originating from the power plant, the two open-pit lignite mines which surround it – Rosia and Pinoasa – the illegal coal storage depot nearby, open conveyor belts and heavy trucks going to the mines and back right in front of their houses. The Rovinari Power Plant is the only of the four operated by Oltenia Energy Complex (OEC) to have its coal delivered on a transport belt directly from the lignite mines and the deposits surrounding it.

Whenever we talk to the locals, there are two constant things they complain about: noise and dust. They have been promised resettlement since 2007, but the mining company has not made any progress in this regard, as the mines are not envisaged to expand towards the village, resettlement is not a priority.

The first results made our jaws drop

The health effects of inhalable PM are well documented by the World Health Organization (WHO) and include respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. The WHO recommends levels for the more coarse PM10 of not above 20 μg/m3 for the annual average and 50 μg/m3 for the 24-hour mean. Because air quality data is unreliable in most countries in the region, Bankwatch has done its own monitoring in different countries since autumn last year.

Our independent particulate matter (PM) monitoring device was installed in Rosia de Jiu on April 26.

Since the machine was finally in our home country, that first evening we watched the measurements online in real time. We couldn’t believe our eyes – it was for the first time we had seen concentrations of above 1500 µg/m³ for an hourly average, and some of the minute-by-minute values went up to values of over 6000 µg/m³!

Particulate matter levels for PM 10 and PM 2.5 in Rosia de Jiu, Romania at different times of day and EU limits for PM10 and PM2.5. The graph shows extremely high peaks for PM 10. The highest value for PM 10 was recorded on May 2, at 10PM local time, with 1783 micrograms per cubic metre. Even though PM 2.5 levels fade in comparison to the PM 10 ones, they have shown peaks of over 100 µg/m3 on 43 instances. — Graph: PM 10 and PM 2.5 levels in Rosia de Jiu at different times of day. (The thin vertical bars represent hourly mean values for PM 2.5 and PM 10. The straight horizontal lines represent EU level standards as per the Air Quality Directive.)

We thought something must have gone wrong and went back to Rosia de Jiu to check. But no, nothing was wrong, that is what the people there have to breathe every day.

Over the 30 days of monitoring PM 10 and PM 2.5 emissions in Rosia de Jiu, it was only on two days that the EU 24-hour limit for PM 10 was not exceeded. In other words over 93 percent of days the PM 10 concentration was above the limit, often times 5-6 times above the allowed daily average of 50 µg/m³. The EU limit on PM 2.5 was exceeded on 23 of the 30 days of monitoring. The EU’s Air Quality Directive allows 35 exceedances of the PM 10 limit for 24 hours over the course of one year. In Rosia de Jiu, this is for sure not the case.

The impact of mining

Distinctly different from the previous locations is that the hourly measurements shows large differences between concentrations of PM 10 and PM 2.5. In other locations, PM 2.5 represented approximately 75% – 80% of the PM 10 emissions, while in Rosia de Jiu this is clearly not the case. The high levels of coarse particles, PM 10, are indicative of its primary sources: the open-cast mine, the coal deposit, open conveyor belts and unpaved road to the mine. PM 2.5 emissions are linked with combustion processes and should therefore always be measures in places where coal power plants operate.

Daily average of particulate matter levels for PM 10 and PM 2.5 in Rosia de Jiu, Romania and EU limits for both pollutants. The graph shows how both PM 2.5 and PM 10 levels exceed the legally allowed limit: PM 2.5 on 23 out of 30 days of monitoring (77%), PM 10 on 28 days out of 30 (93%). — Graph: Daily average of PM 10 and PM 2.5 levels in Rosia de Jiu.

There are several hourly PM 10 peaks, with the highest recorded on May 2, at 10PM local time, with 1783 micrograms per cubic metre. During seven hours of the observation period the PM 10 concentration has been above 1000 µg/m³. This is 20 times above the EU limit. The graph also illustrates how the PM 10 levels peak most around 8AM local time when work starts at the nearby lignite mine, or around 1PM when the shifts change. Even though PM 2.5 levels fade in comparison to the PM 10 ones, they have shown peaks of over 100 µg/m³on 43 instances.

While PM 10 emissions are said not to stay in the air for more than a few hours and not travel more than a few metres, if the concentrations are constant every day it really turns into breathing dust instead of air for this community.

To add to this terrible pollution, noise measurements carried out in November 2016 also show how right the locals are to complain, as the noise produced by the power plant and by the conveyor belts carrying the coal from the mines was above the regulated level at all times.

https://vimeo.com/191766588

The small community of Rosia de Jiu has suffered enough from being at the heart of the lignite operations. Most of the locals are now retired and deserve a peaceful life with their families, who now won’t visit for fear of exposing their children to this pollution.

Coal mining is dirty and unfair and leaving long term scars. OEC, the energy utility operating the power plant and the mines near Rosia de Jiu, needs to make it up to these people in the 11^th hour.

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