Obrenovac

Location:

Pollutants:

Heavy Metals, Arsenic

Transmission:

water, soil, air

Potentially affected people:

75,949

The problem

Millions of tons of contaminated coal ash from the Nikola Tesla Coal Power Plant lie in a vast shallow pit, 100 meters from the Sava River, which flows into the Danube twelve kilometers from this point. This site is one of the highly ranked “black spots” on Serbia’s polluters list. According to some measurements, the air above of city has unhealthy levels of carbon black (lampblack) for as much as a third of the year.

The toxic dump spreads over an area of 500 acres. Water sprinklers attempt to prevent the contaminated ash from spreading but are not very successful on a windy day. Lead and cadmium levels are found 2-10 times higher than permissible levels in the lower Danube. Cadmium levels peaked at the confluence of the Sava and Danube according to one study. Extremely high levels of the pesticide Atrazine in the Sava River prompted an emergency there in 2003.

Health Impact

Inhaling carbon black can cause lung disease and respiratory problems. It is suspected to be a carcinogen when exposed to it over long periods of time. There have been no studies about the health of populations exposed to the toxic ash. The most common occupational health effects reported from workers in the plant were hearing loss, cardiovascular diseases, musculoskeletal disorders, and endocrine diseases.