South Korean Cultural Ecology - 1905 to 1990
Part 4 - Pollution and the Future -- Page 31

F. Toxic-Waste Disposal

In 1983 the Korean government acknowledged that 591,000 tons of hazardous wastes were being generated annually. Laws strictly control mercury, cadmium, lead, chromium, arsenic, organophosphorus, polychlorinated, biphenyls (PCBs), and alkalis. But, there is no means to enforce these laws; in effect no one knows what is actually going on in the toxic-waste disposal arena. Many worker deaths occur from exposure to chemicals such as toluene, mercury, cadmium, and lead. The electronics industry uses more than 250 chemicals and Korea does not have the training, time, or manpower to treat and test patients. Very few professionals are equipped with sufficient knowledge of chemistry for such accidents.

Korea has become severely dependent on nuclear power generators. Nine reactors are in operation and more are being built and these have Korea using nuclear power for 53% of its electricity. Plans are in place for having 55 nuclear plants by the year 2000 for a country 36% of the size of Oregon. That would amount to 137 nuclear plants in the state of Oregon. Where would you put all of the wastes? U.S. firms are supplying the equipment for 12 of the new plants. In December of 1988 radioactive wastes were discovered in a village near the Kori power plant. Even after a $3 million fine more wastes were again disposed in the same village. High incidents of leukemia have been discovered near one plant. Since 1978, there have been 193 accidents that have halted operations in seven plants. The government as one of the costs of the high-speed development has silently accepted the destruction of the environment in Korea. The Korean technocrats have compressed into 30 years, the process of environmental destruction, that it took us in the U.S. over a hundred to accomplish.