OREANDA-NEWS. On February 28, 2008 at OJSC Dneprospetsstal, three Zaporozhye-based industrial companies held a press conference focusing on the problem of slag dumps in the Srednyaya gully, reported the press-centre of Dneprospetsstal.

Speakers presenting their view of the situation included Daniel Valk, Board Chairman at Dneprospetsstal, Aleksandr Putnoki, Vice Board Chairman and Technical Director at OJSC Zaporozhstal, Aleksandr Rabtsun, Vice Board Chairman and Finance Director at OJSC Zaporozhstal, Pavel Aleksandrovich Kravchenko, Board Chairman at OJSC Zaporozhye Ferro-Alloys Works.

The reason this press conference was called is a petition initiated by the deputies of the Regional Council in Zaporozhye for the RUS group and forwarded to the Prime Minister of Ukraine Yulia Timishenko. In their letter the people's elected representatives requested assistance in solving the problems connected with the so-called "technogenic" industrial dump site in the Srednyaya gully and incorrectly blamed the leading Zaporozhye industrial plants for not meeting environmental regulations. The deputies, in point of fact, lobbied for the vested interests of 'Firm Roma L', LLC, claiming development right to land sites in question.

All speakers stressed that the area of the slag dumps in the Srednyaya gully belongs to the Zaporozhye industrial plants, including Dneprospetsstal. This fact is attested to by the State title acts on land plots. Title to industrial waste produced and hence its processing is guaranteed by the law of Ukraine "On Industrial Waste Products". All work on processing the slag in the area of the dumps is conducted on a legitimate basis in compliance with industrial safety regulations.

Dneprospetsstal takes a responsible stand as to its environmental obligations. At present, in the stretch of the Srednyaya gully belonging to the company, a modern state-of-the-art AMCOM slag processing facility has begun operations. The cost of the project is eight million Euros. The facility is manned by a team of eighty people working round-the-clock. This equipment gives us the ability to extract the scrap (leftover steel for the melting of which the slag was used)- a source material strategically important for the company. The slag left after processing is waste material that can be further used for road construction. At the existing rates of processing, (six thousand tons of slag per day) in five-years' time the area will be virtually clean. As regards clearing up the Nagornaya Kanava stream-bed, Dneprospetsstal workers had cleared up its 25 m area as far back as in September and have kept it in proper condition since then.