Is this landfill a greater polluter of the soil or the air? Why is there still no solution to this toxic waste? These are some current issues that have recently become an active topic in order to find a solution for the people in Veles as soon as possible.
Environmentalists from Veles are not happy that the slag hill is still in their town. They say that they expected a more serious dynamic in the cleaning of the landfill, in order to be able to move on to the next step more quickly, remediation of the contaminated soil and assessment of the damage done to the underground water from long-term pollution.
The slag dump, a remnant of the work of the former Zinc and Lead Smelter, is one of the few historical ecological hotspots in the country. The smelter started operating in 1973 and stopped in 2005. In the period that followed, he bought the private company “Metrudhem”, which he tried to restart in 2011, but the attempt was unsuccessful. As a result, the environmental associations of Veles, supported by the inhabitants of the city, organized several protests, the most massive of which was the one in November of the same year, with which they made it known that they will not allow the big polluter to operate once again, both on the air and on the soil.
That year, people in Veles also initiated a change to the General Urban Plan of the city before the Ministry of Transport and Communications, for the conversion of the location where the industrial capacity is located from an industrial zone for light and non-polluting industry to a green belt. The procedure ended in 2013, when the Council of Veles finally verified the amendment. The request to turn the location into greenery was also confirmed by the Ministry of Health after the soil research that proved the presence of heavy metals, primarily lead and cadmium, which are dangerous for the health of the citizens.
For this reason, Veles ecologists, in addition to trying to prevent air pollution by stopping the work of the Topilnica, now appeal that it is necessary to take out the slag as soon as possible, so that the remediation process can begin and thus also protect the soil from pollution.
From the students of SSOU “Dimitrija Chupovski” Veles , Republic of North Macedonia