Abstract:
On 18 March 2022, the Pretoria High Court found that chronic
air pollution is a violation of Section 24 of the South African
Constitution, and that South Africans have a right to an
environment that is not harmful to their health and well-being
(CER, 2022). This “has important implications for communities
forced to live with the debilitating effects of air pollution on the
Mpumalanga Highveld, and more broadly for constitutional
jurisprudence and government accountability” (CER, 2022).
Since 2019, two environmental justice groups, groundWork and
the Vukani Environmental Justice Movement, represented by
the Centre for Environmental Rights (CER), sought recourse from
the High Court on the high air pollution levels in the Highveld
Priority Area (HPA). The basis of this “Deadly Air” Case was a
declaration that “the poor air quality in the Highveld Priority
Area is a breach of the residents’ right to an environment that is
not harmful to their health and wellbeing” (CER, 2022).
The HPA is known for its poor air quality. Numerous studies
have reported widespread non-compliance with the PM and O3,
as well as NOx and SO2 National Ambient Air Quality Standards
(NAAQS) (Steyn and Kornelius 2018; Feig et al., 2019; Chindhindi
et al., 2019; Morosele and Langerman 2020). There are a range
of air pollution sources which contribute to the poor air quality
in the HPA, including industry, roads, vehicles, mining, power
generation, biomass burning, wind-blown dust, domestic fuel use practices and waste burning, to name a few (Ross et
al., 2007; Nkosi et al., 2018; Walton et al., 2021). The negative
impacts of the air pollution are felt by many who reside on the
Highveld and even beyond. Much pressure has been placed on
government by civil society and legal experts to improve the
air quality in the region, leading to many difficult discussions.
Consequently, over the past years, the air quality in the airshed
has become the focus of many air pollution-related research
studies, legal debates and media releases.
