Ulsan's factories fight the summer swelter with ice machines, cooling vests and chilled fruit punch

Workers poured out of the HD Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI) shipyard in Dong District, Ulsan, at about 6 p.m. on July 24 — the end of a workday that had peaked at 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit). They had stripped off their overalls and changed into shorts and short sleeves, and the day of heat and labor showed on their faces.

"Wring out your overalls by hand, and sweat pours out of them," said a worker surnamed Kim, who works on the yard floor. "You can just assume I spent the whole day soaked."

The surface of a ship's steel plating exceeds 50 degrees Celsius in the summer sun. Welders work close to flames above 1,200 degrees Celsius. Once workers don their overalls, safety boots, hard hat and goggles, their underwear is soaked through within minutes.

"When break time comes, the first place I go is wherever the company has put an air conditioner, and I lie down," he said. "The heat started late this summer, but what my body is feeling is much worse than other years."

Shipyards, car plants, refining and petrochemical complexes and smelters across Ulsan are lengthening breaks and adding cooling equipment to head off heat-related illnesses. Ice water, cooling vests, chilled fruit punch and restorative meals have all been pressed into service.

HD HHI has extended its lunch break by 30 minutes through Aug. 31. When the apparent temperature reaches 33 degrees Celsius, rest periods double to 20 minutes from 10 as per the legal requirements. The company has built separate rest areas on board ships and runs about 270 shelters in all, including converted buses, shade canopies and the pop-up structures Koreans call "Mongolian tents." It has added ice machines and portable air conditioners, and hands out ice water, salt and glucose tablets and fan-equipped vests. A "roving snack truck" serving 1,000 portions at a time of hwachae, a chilled fruit punch, will run until early September.

Refiners and petrochemical producers, who work with hot oil and gas year-round, have also stepped up their own measures.

SK Ulsan CLX, the country's largest refining and petrochemical production base, adds 10 minutes of rest an hour when a heat wave advisory is issued and 15 minutes under a heat wave warning.

A heat advisory is issued when the daily maximum apparent temperature is forecast to remain at or above 33 degrees Celsius. A heat wave emergency warning is issued when an area has already endured at least two straight days with an apparent temperature of 35 degrees Celsius or higher and is expected to experience an apparent temperature of at least 38 degrees Celsius for a day or a daytime high of 39 degrees Celsius or above. 

Ice water and salt tablets are kept near work areas, and cooling clothing and ice pack vests are mandatory. When a heat wave warning is in effect, the plant avoids work between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. when it can and shifts tasks to early morning or overnight.

"We check workers' body temperature and general condition at frequent intervals," a company representative said.

S-Oil's Ulsan plant issues cups of ice, sports drinks and heat kits, and serves restorative dishes such as samgyetang, a ginseng chicken soup, along with watermelon once a week. LS MnM's Onsan smelter, which runs furnaces above 1,200 degrees Celsius, keeps ice cream, vitamins and salt and glucose tablets on site. Above a set temperature, it messages every employee with reminders to drink water and rest, and halts outdoor work when necessary. Hyundai Motor's Ulsan plant runs ice machines along its production lines and serves restorative dishes and frozen desserts daily.

The spending reflects a summer that keeps getting longer. Analysis by the Ulsan Research Institute of Korea Meteorological Administration data put the city at 121 summer days last year. The count measures stretches in which the daily mean temperature held at 20 degrees Celsius or above. That is 16 days more than in 1995 and 23 more than in 1975. Heat wave days and tropical nights are both trending upward.

A tropical night refers to a phenomenon when nighttime temperatures stay above 25 degrees Celcius.

The longer season is affecting workers' health. Ulsan recorded 17.2 cases of heat-related illnesses per 100,000 residents last year, the second-highest rate in the country, Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency figures show. The concentration of factories and outdoor worksites in the city leaves unusually large numbers of workers exposed.

The heat also produces one of Ulsan's more particular sights. Large employers, including HD HHI and Hyundai Motor, take their collective summer break at the same time — at the end of July and the start of August. The industrial city empties as about 300,000 of Ulsan's 1.1 million residents are Hyundai employees and their families. Many local businesses shut down alongside them, and some city bus routes run reduced services.

The city government is building infrastructure to reduce the toll of the summer heat. Through a central government competition, it plans to develop a disaster safety industry facility equipped with an artificial climate chamber, where safety products and technologies designed for extreme heat can be tested, evaluated and certified. It also intends to work with the heat wave research center at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology on AI-based localized heat data and response technology tailored to industrial sites.

"With climate change, heat has moved past seasonal discomfort and become a disaster that threatens safety on industrial sites," Kim Hye-rin, a researcher at the center, said.

"On shipbuilding, automotive and petrochemical sites, radiant heat piles on top of an already hot and humid environment, so the 'perceived' temperature is higher and the risk of heat illness is greater. That calls for more than longer breaks. It needs a comprehensive system covering adjusted working hours, expanded cooling equipment and real-time heat risk management."

BY KIM YOUN-HO [[email protected]]