Johannesburg ’s Golden Legacy Includes Radioactive Dump By Kevin Crowley Feb 11, 2014 12:00 AM GMT+0200 Johannesburg sits atop the world’s most productive gold reef -- a staggering 40,000 tons of the precious metal has been mined from it during a history tracing back 130 years. That legacy of riches has left behind a toxic inheritance: radioactivity from uranium hauled up in the mining process. Scientists have found uranium quantities in rivers west of the city to be as much as 4,000 times natural levels and in tap water as much as 20 times higher . A soil sample taken by Bloomberg News and tested by government-certified WaterLab Ltd. (http://www.waterlab.co .za/) from pumpkin roots grown a little more than a mile from a recently closed gold mine contained five times more uranium than background levels considered normal by the International Atomic Energy Agency (http://www.iaea.org/newscenter/features/du/du_qaa.shtml) . Photographer: Dean Hutton/Bloomberg A traffic highway and railway lines, right, pass waste ground and a mine dump in Johannesburg, South Africa, on Dec. 14, 2013. While Johannesburg flourished after the discovery of gold in 1886 the stress that the mining has placed on undergroundrock formations has increased seismic activity. Save Share SUSTAINABILITY
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Johannesburg’s Golden Legacy Includes Radioactive Dump - Bloomberg
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8/12/2019 Johannesburg’s Golden Legacy Includes Radioactive Dump - Bloomberg
hat legacy’s unsightly side is in plain view here. Waste rock from hundreds of mines that have been developed
ver the years has been deposited around Johannesburg in mounds that cover a combined area of 400,000
quare kilometers and can be as many as 10 stories high. One such dump, which looks like a flat-topped sand
ountain, sits next to the FNB Stadium (http://www.stadiummanagement.co.za/), where the final of soccer’s
World Cup was played in 2010.
he tailings contain about 600,000 tons of uranium, three times the amount exported during the Cold War,
ccording to Professor Frank Winde (http://www.nwu.ac.za/geography/staff/Frank_Winde) at Southfrica’s North-West University (http://www.nwu.ac.za/). It’s getting into the water supply, according to
Winde, a German-born scientist who has studied the effect of uranium on South Africa’s environment for 30
ears and overseen university testing for radiation levels.
his happens in a variety of ways, according to Winde. The radioactive metal dissolves in rainwater and runs
ff the dumps into rivers during storms or is carried into water sources when it seeps through porous rock as
bandoned mines are flooded. It can also be spilled by companies that re-mine dumps for the metal. Dust clouds
ontaining uranium form when high winds hit the dumps.
oil taken by Bloomberg News from pumpkin roots about 100 meters away from Wonderfonteinspruit, a stream
eding the Vaal River and close to Blyvooruitzicht, was found to contain 10.4 milligrams of uranium perlogram. That’s five times higher than the 2 milligrams per kilogram average, according to the IAEA.
No Threat’
habangu, the mineral resources minister, says the levels aren’t cause for alarm.
Scientifically, it has been proven we’re not at a level that poses a health threat to communities,” she said in an
terview.
Winde disagrees. “We have generally underestimated the presence of uranium in the water supply,” he said. “If
e government has a study saying it’s safe then I would like to see it. As far as I’m aware, nobody has studied
hether it has an impact on general health, on the likelihood of cancer, on hormonal functions, on DNA” in
outh Africa.
wo hours west of Johannesburg’s business district of Sandton lies Khutsong, a township of 60,000 from which
e soil sample was taken. Residents there struggle daily for water, electricity and work.
wo-bedroom brick houses built by the local government are surrounded by improvised shacks with corrugated
on roofs. Jobs are scarce after gold mines, including Blyvooruitzicht, were closed.
No Choice
While the government prohibits people from drinking, irrigating and washing in water taken directly from
vers, for thousands living in an area known as the West Rand there is no choice, said Sello Mokoena, 27, aorker on the vegetable patch in Khutsong.
People tell us that the water is polluted from the mines but we have nothing else,” said Mokoena, wearing a
reen sports shirt and orange trousers. He earns about 700 rand ($63) a month working on the vegetable patch
nd herding livestock, and uses it to support his mother, three brothers and a sister.
he Bloomberg soil sample was taken from an area suspected of containing mine waste and was not part of a
ientific study. No vegetables picked from the patch by Bloomberg News were found to contain elevated levelsf uranium.
8/12/2019 Johannesburg’s Golden Legacy Includes Radioactive Dump - Bloomberg
ng_ja), referred questions to West Rand District Municipality. The municipality is “concerned with all
ctivities which may have a negative impact on public health,” Cheleng Khotle, a manager for municipal health,
aid in a statement. “The municipalities may currently not be able to provide funding” for further studies.
Continued technical monitoring is encouraged and would be supported by municipalities through
articipation.”
Elevated Levels
Water samples from Wonderfonteinspruit show uranium levels on average 400 times background levels, and
aching as high as 4,000 times, according to Winde, who compiled a series of studies he and other scientists
ave done over the past 20 years.
Winde detected uranium levels of 53 micrograms per liter at the Boskop Dam, which supplies Potchefstroom, a
wn 75 miles west of Johannesburg and about 25 miles southwest of Blyvooruitzicht, in November 2012. That
dicates 21 micrograms per liter of uranium in tap water sourced from that dam, 40 percent higher than the
World Health Organization (http://www.who.int/en/)’s safe level of 15 micrograms per liter, he said.
While that was a one-time test and exceeded usual tap-water readings of about 5 micrograms per liter in
otchefstroom, below the safe level, it shows that residents are sometimes exposed to dangerous water quality,
aid Winde, who lives in the town and doesn’t drink the water.
Water Safety
Wonderfonteinspruit, Carletonville, and Potchefstroom are towns in the West Rand, downstream from
ohannesburg and the mine-waste dumps. The metropolis’s water supply isn’t contaminated because it comes
om the upper part of the Vaal River and from nearby Lesotho, a landlocked mountainous kingdom surrounded
y South Africa.
ap water in the West Rand including Potchefstroom is safe to drink, according to Marius Keet, senior manager
the Department of Water Affairs. (http://www.dwaf.gov.za/)
At the moment there’s no danger there,” he said. “We’re in contact with the scientists there and there are
oncerns -- not now, but in the future -- if there is a slow increase of uranium in the feed water.”
eople shouldn’t drink water directly from rivers, such as Wonderfonteinspruit, dams or seasonal streams in the
ea, Keet said.
You’re not allowed to take water from any river in South Africa,” he said. “For as much as uranium is ahallenge, there’s also the challenge of bacteria.”
outh Africa is unique among gold-mining countries because of the dense population that has grown up around
s mines. That means exposure to low levels of uranium over a long period of time is unprecedented and should
e investigated by the government, according to Cansa’s Albrecht.
2011, Cansa found uranium levels in two Carletonville residents’ teeth that were as many as 100 times higher
an a 2007 study that took the same measurement from people living in a Brazilian mining area.
he Department of Water Affairs’ Keet said he’s in favor of studying the effect of low levels of uranium intake
ver long periods of time on people’s health. The Department of Health should conduct such research, he said.
is major concern is uranium seeping from the mine dumps through dolomitic rock, which is porous, and into
e water table. “That will have to be well monitored in the future,” he said.
Mines’ Responsibility
he government’s long-term approach to remove uranium from mine dumps is to allow companies to re-mine
em for gold, eliminating toxic wastes as they go. A number of companies are already doing that, among them
ngloGold Ashanti Ltd. (/quote/ANG:SJ), DRDGold Ltd. and Mintails Ltd.
RDGold, which doesn’t mine in the West Rand, said this process is “enormously” helpful because it removes
aste and deposits it in modern tailings complexes under the scrutiny of regulators. Mintails is “proud to be
aying a leading role” in removing hazardous materials from “potentially the most uranium contaminated
ndscape in the world,” said Turton, who acts as an adviser to the company.
While re-mining can be part of a solution to uranium pollution, it’s also part of the problem, according toMariette Liefferink, CEO of the Federation for a Sustainable Environment (http://www.fse.org.za/).
Cost-cutting and disregard for the environment mean there are radioactive spillages every few weeks in the
West Rand,” she said. “Unless these mining companies mine cleanly, they will only make the situation worse.”
Environmental Incidents
ngloGold was responsible for 10 environmental incidents it classified as “significant” in South Africa in 2012,ccording to the company’s annual report (http://www.aga-reports.com/12/os/performance/cyanide-waste-
anagement). They involved toxic waste being spilled onto farmland and in rivers. Of the 10 incidents, seven
ere attributed to Mine Waste Solutions, which re-mines waste material and was bought for $335 million from
irst Uranium Corp. (/quote/FUU:SJ) two years ago.
he company has spent about $90 million upgrading Mine Waste Solutions since the acquisition and has
mproved its water monitoring, pipeline maintenance as well as creating so-called containing areas for potential
pills, CEO Srinivasan Venkatakrishnan (http://search.bloomberg.com/search?