workforce’s skills base. An estimated three-quarters of the country’s 209 mines are considered to be highly prone to methane blasts. Death rates began to rise sharply when, aſter in- dependence, the government slashed subsidies to the industry. About 5,000 miners have died since then, and the country’s mines today are considered among the world’s most dangerous as hundreds of miners die in indus- trial accidents every year. Very bad discipline is usually blamed. Safety regulations are continually flouted be- cause the pit owners aim to maintain production levels at any cost, while the miners do not take proper care of themselves as they seek to increase personal output. Management in pri- vatized mines is reportedly poor, with incentives to maximize production at the cost of mine safety (anecdo- tally, this is said to have meant reduc- ing roof support intervals well below minimum standards). But the picture painted by official statistics suggests that safety performance is improving.
Donbas makes enormous and some- times lethal demands on its miners. But it has another distinction too, one which few regions would envy: it blights the lives of many who never go near a mine. You do not hew coal
or make steel without producing large quantities of pollution. And however careful you may be in controlling it, some of the filth will still find its way into living creatures, including people.
According to the State Statistics Com- mittee, Donetsk Oblast accounted for 33.9 per cent of total emissions of harmful substances from station- ary sources in Ukraine in 2008. Tis is about 391 kg of pollution emitted for every single inhabitant. Te total amount of 1,533,400 tonnes is pro- duced by more than 1,170 enterprises in various industrial sectors. From the second half of 2008 a tendency towards a reduction in gross emissions of harm- ful substances in the region was ob- served, related to the onset of the glob- al financial crisis. However, the level of air pollution in cities such as Donetsk, Dzerzhynsk, Yenakiieve, Makiivka, Horlivka and Mariupol remains high. Te main atmospheric air pollutants of Donetsk Oblast, producing 91 per cent of gross emissions of harmful sub- stances, are seven coke-chemical en- terprises, five thermal power stations, six metallurgical plants, and 120 mines and mining enterprises.
Despite the serious decline in annual coal production, Donbas mines are still
Pollutant emissions
per captia in kg
100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450
50 0
per km2 in t
100
10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80
0
Source: State of the Environment Report for Donetsk Oblast, 2007 Produced by Zoi Environment Network, May 2010
releasing 1.5 to 2.2 billion m3 of meth- ane into the atmosphere every year. It is one of the most powerful greenhouse gases and these emissions are equiva- lent to about 10–15 million tonnes of
CO2. Methane also continues to be emitted by mines which have closed. Although the gas is a promising energy vector, only 5 to 8 per cent of its total volume is used in industry. Te Donetsk basin has estimated methane reserves of 11.5 trillion m3. Te A.F. Zasy- adko mine is an example of how en-
vironmentally friendly energy-saving technologies can be implemented thanks to financial instruments under the Kyoto Protocol. Under the terms of the future contract with Austrian and Japanese government bodies a meth- ane-utilization facility was installed and a cogeneration power plant was started. Some 41 million m3 of meth- ane has been processed, with 194.24 million kW of electrical energy and 168,320 Gcal of thermal energy pro- duced at the mine.
31
Ukraine Donetsk Oblast Dnipropetrivsk Oblast Luhansk Oblast Kharkiv Oblast Odesa Oblast Lviv Oblast
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44