Contaminated soil from Tianjin blasts to be stored in ‘leak-proof’ tank just 4km from explosion site
The authorities in Tianjin are building a 20,000-square metre “leak-proof” tank to store contaminated soil from the scene of the huge explosions at a dangerous goods warehouse earlier this month.
The pool is to be built 4km from the site of the explosions in Tianjin port, the state-run news agency Xinhua said.
A 13-cm “impermeable layer” of sand and bricks will be placed at the bottom and workers are busy lining the tank with leak-proof material, the report said.
It will come into service soon, according to the report.
Residents living near blast site have reported bad smells in the past few days, the China News Service reported on Friday.
The city’s environmental protection department said on its social media account that the bad odour was from the gas methanethiol, which can be produced by decomposing organic matter, and that it did not pose a threat to health.
Meanwhile, media in China have reported that Wang Jinwen, the only central government official among 11 who were criminally detained by prosecutors yesterday, may have helped lobby for the warehouse firm to get approval to handle dangerous chemicals.
Ruihai International Logistics could not get all the approvals it needed to convert its base in Tianjin port into a dangerous goods warehouse and Wang had intervened to help, the China Business News reported, citing unnamed sources.
Wang is a deputy inspector at the Ministry of Transport and he has been accused by prosecutors of abuse of power.
Eighty-eight firefighters and nine policemen are known to have died in the disaster.
Twenty-eight people remain unaccounted for.
