Documents obtained by the Australian Workers Union (AWU) through freedom of information laws show tunnellers are exposed to cancer-causing dust while building government projects like Metro West, and Metro City & Southwest, the AWU has said in a statement published on its website on November 26th.
One in three air quality tests during construction of Metro City & Southwest exceeded the Workplace Exposure Standard (WES), some by 208 times, according to documents obtained from Transport for NSW (TfNSW), the statement says.
Air quality reports at the three Metro West sites currently being bored show that toxic silica dust levels have exceeded the WES 1 in 7 times. The WES is .05 milligrams per cubic metre.
The data shows tunnelling using roadheaders exposes workers to silica dust levels far greater than engineered stone kitchen benchtops, which were banned after an AWU campaign.
Only a small amount of tunnelling is undertaken using roadheaders on Sydney Metro, but projects like NorthConnex, WestConnex, M6 stage 1, and Western Harbour Tunnel though, all use roadheaders all the time to construct all of their tunnels (the Western Harbour Tunnel is also using TBMs), to provide the flatter, wider tunnel to accommodate 3+ lanes of traffic.
On September 1 new national laws took effect which give workers the right to demand multiple safety control measures such as PPE, water suppression, on-tool extraction systems and local exhaust ventilation systems.
Workers can also demand a silica risk control plan from the employer in a high-risk environment. For example, Hawkesbury Sandstone under Sydney is around 85% silica content which makes it dangerous because of the very high concentrations of silica dust.
Civil engineering companies need to come clean about the health impacts of tunnelling on their workers, said Chris Donovan, Assistant National Secretary.
“No Australian in 2024 should be poisoned by toxic dust at work, not with the technology we have today,” said Mr Donovan.
“Sydneysiders would be ropable if they knew the new metro they were sitting on, or underground motorway they were driving through came at the expense of someone’s health.
“We need to find out what’s happened underground in these projects right now so we can stop it happening in the future,” said Mr Donovan.
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