A year since the first COVID-19 cases appeared in South Africa, the disease has killed more than 50,000 people. A new study now shows that a similar number of South Africans die each year due to diseases caused by air pollution linked with the burning of fossil fuels. There are days when the air around the Vaal Triangle is so dirty you can taste it. The locals call it the ‘Vuil Driehoek’, the Dirty Triangle because the air is notoriously filthy, clogged with soot and chemicals from the mines, smelters, and other manufacturing plants in this industrial hub about 60 kilometers south of Johannesburg. It holds the unenviable title of having the country’s most polluted air. Alma Viviers was born in Sasolburg, a city in the heart of the Vaal Triangle that got its name from the petrochemical giant Sasol which today has one of its biggest and most polluting coal-to-gas refineries still operating in the area. When Viviers was a child in the 1980s, ‘Sasol chest’ was a thing. That’s the local slang for … Continue reading Fossil fuel’s killer air pollution: South Africa’s death toll