The removal cost to get rid of all Eternit's asbestos – which can cause lung diseases and cancer when fibres are released – in Flanders would exceed €100 million every year for the next two decades.
Last weekend, Flemish Environment Minister Zuhal Demir confirmed she has set her sights on holding to account Eternit (now Etex), which made its fame and fortune last century by producing asbestos cement products. It knew about this risk for decades but minimised the dangers of its products, lobbied against restrictive legislation and swept any damaging information under the rug.
In the past six years, Flanders itself has already spent €169 million on removing asbestos, but Demir stated that it should be the Belgian company paying to help free the region of the product which can pose major health risks. The exact amount she demanded was not disclosed, but Demir has now stated that it would cost more than €100 million every year for the next 20 years to remove all Etertnit asbestos from Flanders.
To calculate this figure, the Flemish Public Waste Agency (OVAM) carried out an exercise in which it calculated the theoretical removal cost of all Eternit asbestos present in the region. The company produced a whole range of asbestos cement applications and had two sites in Flanders at Kappele-op-den-Bos and Tisselt.
Large responsibility
Some 2.3 million tonnes of asbestos were still present in Flanders in 2019, and Eternit is thought to be responsible for 65% of the asbestos cement produced and used in the region, according to the OVAM estimates.
"If a period of 20 years is taken to remove the quantity of 2 million tonnes of asbestos cement at the current cost of €1,500 per tonne, this results in a (theoretical) removal cost of about €100 million per year," Demir noted.
Whether Demir's claim corresponds to the above-mentioned estimate, Demir did not confirm in the context of the Flemish government's negotiating position, but she did stress that the claim is "significantly more" than the amount in the 2014 settlement. This saw former environment minister Joke Schauvliege (CD&V) and the OVAM strike a deal with Eternit in which it agreed to pay €4.8 million for the removal of asbestos between 2014 and 2030.
