This document consists of the analysis of the social and economic impacts produced by
the activities and results of the LIFE GAIN project carried out by COMSA.
The project tries to enhance the valorisation of an industrial waste product, such as the
black slag derived from the steel production, using it in the railway foundations layers.
As a result it will improve the mechanical properties of the track and clearly reduce the
environmental impact of the track maintenance, renewal and construction.
The LIFE GAIN is carried out in a context where the eco-friendly activities are
promoted by the European Union since it is important to reduce the waste production
and the social and environmental impact that it has. With this objective, this project has
been presented to solve the problem of Steel Furnace Slag (SFS), which actually is an
important waste product in the whole Europe.
With this analysis we have tried to conclude which is the impact of the project on the
society and to evaluate the social and economic impacts that the project actions will
have in the influence zone of the activities. Likewise, we also try to gain knowledge
about the social opinion of a project like that, since nowadays it’s important to include
the population feedback in the companies’ actions and strategies to improve their results
and turnover.
In the first place, with the aim to make clear the objectives and the previous research
and activities of the LIFE GAIN project, a brief introduction has been done. This
introduction consists of the description of the context and objectives of the project and
the state of the art of the SFS. Furthermore, the properties and the previous tests done in
the investigation of the valorised product (SFS-RAIL) are detailed in this point to have
an idea about the commercialized product.
Secondly, it is presented the diagnosis of the studied area, which describes and
characterizes different topics of the project’s influence zone. In this chapter we have
analysed the territory and demography of the area since it is an important issue to
quantify and evaluate the possible impact of the project in the society and the
surrounding environment. A delimitation of the territory influenced by the project has
been necessary to analyse the local impact. Moreover, the description of the structure,
distribution and evolution of the population affected has been done to get a better
characterization of the region inhabitants. In addition, we have analysed the active
population that we could find in the area, which will be a priori the most affected group
by the generation of economic activity because of the project actions.
In addition, the local business network has been studied in order to quantify the
contribution of each industrial sector in the economic activity of the region and bear out
the importance of the siderurgy sector in the two areas of analysis. In the same way, the
labour mobility patterns of the population in the influence zone are analysed to identify
the main poles of attraction. It is important to characterize the situation of the industry,
since the new industrial activity created by the project could modify this flow of daily
trips or enhance the trends if it is in line with them.
Furthermore, in this chapter we have carried out an anonymous survey to the population
of the region to know their opinion about the project analysed since it is undeniable the
relation between the activity of a company and the society. Nowadays, it’s important to
establish a dynamic interaction with the different social agents, where its expectations
and opinions are included in the company strategies. The information flows resulting
from this new dynamics are very precious actives for the company since it will provide
a higher sensitivity with the surrounding area, helping to anticipate risks and to get more
profit from the opportunities that may arise.
To complete this section, a more detailed analysis of the siderurgy industry of the
project and field test influence zone has been carried out. During this analysis we have
characterised and delimitated the siderurgy sector of Asturias and Catalonia and its
economic contribution in the whole country concluding that both of them are two of the
most important Spanish siderurgy areas. The waste production of the sector and the
waste recycling techniques are also described since it will be necessary to quantify and
evaluate the innovations introduced by the project and how it will affect to the amount
of waste landfilled and to the different uses that black slag have in the present.
Continuing with the scheme of the analysis, the different impacts of the project and its
consequences in the topics explained above have been described in the next chapter. We
have summarized the main impacts in different topics such as the impact of the foreseen
investment, the impact of the increase of steel slag recycling, the impact of the decrease
of industrial waste, the impact of the reduction of quarries activity and the impact of the
increase of jobs. A relation and the consequences in the topics of the previous chapters
have been established for the correct evaluation of the impacts.
To finish with the analysis, all the conclusions extracted from the different chapters of
the evaluation of the project have been presented summarized in a list. Some positive
results derived from the implementation of the project have been identified, which allow
us to conclude that this project is interesting in both social and economic terms. |