Apart from Zenica and Sarajevo, there is a serious problem with air quality in municipality Kakanj. Last Tuesday a public hearing was held entitled “Improving Air Quality through Energy Efficiency Projects at the Local Level”. The guest lecturer was doc.dr. Azrudin Husika from the Mechanical Engineering Faculty in Sarajevo.
Kakanj is an industrial city with a huge economic potential, so it ranks among the small but economically strong production capacities in BiH that improves the lives of its citizens. Unfortunately, due to huge industry and toxic emissions from the industrial plants, it threatens to contaminate the environment. Even though among the industrial facilities in Kakanj there exists a noticeable tendency to reduce the pollution, Kakanj continues to be one of the most polluted cities in BiH.
In Kakanj there is awareness that the problem cannot be solved overnight, but they are happy that they have economic entities that are socially responsible and sensitive to the problems. Currently there are three metering stations. For one of them, they have been collecting money for three years. However, they have not received help from the Ministry of Environment and Tourism of BiH regarding the meter stations.
A series of large and small projects have been realized with the goal to improve the environment in this city. The Municipality announced that more has to be done in Kakanj, but that a number of concrete measures have already been taken.
“Placing bag filters solved the huge problem of dust that is collected daily. This filter greatly improved the air quality, and eliminated in large amounts the dust. Simply by eliminating “Ćire” that passed through Kakanj everyday, we are left without 80 tons of gas emissions”, said Saida Berbić, The Head of the Office for Environmental Protection in Kakanj.
Even though citizens see positive changes, are still not satisfied with the current situation.
“The biggest problem comes from household furnaces, small boilers that use tires as fuel and various other garbage. I call on the municipal government to finish the project of central heating for the entire city and suburbs as soon as possible”, said citizen of Kakanj Muamer Bešić in an interview with “Novo Vrijeme”.
