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Thor Chemicals is a UK-based company that is famous for shipping hazardous waste containing mercury to South Africa. The mercury has leaked to the local water table and caused large amount of cases of mercury poisoning.

Thor Chemicals is a company owned by Thor Holdings in Manchester, England. It manufactures biocides, textile auxiliaries and metallic organic soaps. It operated a mercury plant in the UK until 1987, when the operations were moved to South Africa under the threat of Health and Safety Executive prosecution. There was very little environmental regulation in the apartheid-era South Africa.

Mercury reclamation in KwaZulu

Thor Chemicals founded a mercury-reclamation plant in Cato Ridge in the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. Thor chemicals intended to treat the chemical waste to recover the mercury. They accepted more mercury waste from USA, Italy, Brazil and the UK.

The mercury pollution around the storage area came to light in 1989 during the investigation by US newspaper St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Analysis of the Mngeweni river water showed that it was heavily polluted with mercury; the river flows into Umgeni river which Durban uses as a water source.

Thor employees were affected as well. In one stage 28% of their employees were diagnosed with mercury poisoning. Company accused local people of stealing the used drums and washing them in the river for further use.

South African government ordered the company to clean up the waste but eventually belittled the problem.

Around 1992 two environmental organizations, Greenpeace and Earthlife Africa, began to collect evidence against Thor Chemicals. In the same year in the UK, the company was charged of culpable homicide and violations of the Machinery and Occupational Safety Act. Company promised to close up its plant by 1996, which it did.

Two US companies, American Cyanamid and Borden Chemicals, eventually stopped shipping their waste to South Africa.

In 1994, a claim against the company was filed in the High Court in London on behalf of the first three victims. It charged that Thor Chemicals was negligent in transportation of the chemicals from one country to another and failed to protect its employees. Thor Chemicals pleaded guilty of lesser charge of negligence and paid a fine of 14.500 rands (about U$3900).

In the same year, South African Department of Environmental Affairs found 10.000 drums, about 8000 tons, of untreated waste in storage. There were claims that the company had never intended to recycle the waste, just to stockpile it. Later environmental impact reports found that there were still significant leaks of mercury to the environment, water table and nearby springs.

In 1995 South African government set up a commission after death of two former workers.

In 1997 Thor Chemicals in South Africa settled out of court without admission of liability and paid 14.3 million rands (U$2.1 million) to 20 former employees with mercury poisoning. Year later 20 more employees filed a similar claim. Soon after that the company shifted its assets to a newly formed company Tato Holdings to reduce its effective assets to U$3.6 billion. The company settled the new claim, again out of court, in October 2000 and paid R2.7 million (about $353,000). Company still refused to clean up the area.

The cleanup of the polluted area in KwaZulu finally started in 2004 when the Thor Chemicals agreed to pay 24 million rands for it.

In 2001, Oosthuizen and Ehrlich reported elevated mercury concentrations in the hair of people consuming fish from the Mgeni (uMngeni) River downstream of Cato Ridge and warned that the problem could become more serious. In 2010, Papu-Zamxaka and co-workers confirmed mercury contamination of river and dam sediments. They also measured mercury in fish and human hair samples at concentrations that exceed World Health Organisation guidelines.