SEPTEMBER 9

  • `TCCL causing mercury pollution'
  • Garbage dump at Madipakkam poses a health hazard
  • Rains are going away but IMD looking the other way

  • `TCCL causing mercury pollution'

    THE HINDU [9 SEPTEMBER, 2002]

    KOCHI Sept. 8. The State Government-owned Travancore-Cochin Chemicals Limited (TCCL) near here, one of the oldest chlorine and caustic soda plants in the country, has been found to be causing serious mercury pollution by a study carried out by the Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment (CSE).

    The TCCL releases three times the average amount of mercury released into the environment by the caustic-chlorine industry in the country, according to the Green Rating Project of the CSE. Mercury poisoning can cause damage to the human nervous system. It can lead to tremors and alterations in the personality and the moods.

    ``On an average, the TCCL releases 396 grams of mercury into the environment while producing just one tonne caustic soda from the mercury cell process,'' the study pointed out. ``This is almost three times the average amount of mercury released by the caustic-chlorine sector.''

    In the year-long study, the Green Rating Project monitored 22 factories which covered some 90 per cent of the caustic-chlorine industry in India. The study considered the company's three-year performance during 1997-2000. The Green Rating Project (GRP) results were released by the former Union Finance Minister, Manmohan Singh, at a ceremony held in Delhi last week. ``This is one of the most extensive studies ever to have been undertaken on caustic-chlorine industry in the world,'' the CSE says.

    This was the third time the GRP was assessing different sectors of Indian industry to check out their eco-friendliness. The GRP, wherein an NGO rates the industry on its environment performance, is claimed to be one of its kind in the world.

    The TCCL was rated as the `worst-performing company' among the 22. It scored just 15.1 per cent marks, while the best-performing company--Chemfab Alkalis Limited--scored 46.6. The TCCL scored consistently low marks in most of the 150 parameters used to assess performance. ``The most environmentally damaging aspect of the company is its mercury pollution,'' the study said.

    The TCCL, located on banks of the Periyar, was set up in 1951. It supplies chlorine to purify much of the piped water supplied in Kerala. The loss-making company has failed to keep pace with changing technologies to minimise pollution. ``The company has been incurring huge losses, and its management quoted this as the reason for not taking up environment protection initiatives.'' About 42 per cent of total caustic soda production at TCCL was based on mercury-cell process and 58 per cent on membrane cell process. ``The company has no environment management system in place,'' the GRP pointed out.

    The CSE study reveals that the caustic-chlorine industry releases an astounding 60-70 tonnes of mercury every year to the country's environment. ``This is 70 times the amount of mercury that triggered the Minamata tragedy (off the Minamata Bay in Japan in 1950s affecting thousands of people).''

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    Garbage dump at Madipakkam poses a health hazard

    THE HINDU [9 SEPTEMBER, 2002]
    Akila Dinakar

    CHENNAI Sept. 8. Residents of Mahalakshmi Nagar in Madipakkam have been living amidst stench from garbage. The Naidu pond, surrounded by houses and a Siva Vishnu temple, has been the source of not merely civic nuisance, but ill-health. It had ``claimed'' two lives _`Bombay' Srinivasan and Savitri.

    The two were asthma patients and toxic fumes from the burning garbage deteriorated their health condition and led to their death, R. Srinivasan, president of the Sri Mahalakshmi Nagar Residents Welfare Association, said.

    Before his death, `Bombay' Srinivasan had registered a complaint with the town panchayat office that the garbage dumping was affecting his health and if he happened to die, this would be the cause.

    Padmini Narasimhan, a housewife, residing near the dumpyard, said she was suffering from severe cough and the three-year old son of their tenants was also suffering from respiratory problems due to inhaling fumes from the burning garbage which contained plastics and PVC.

    ``We get an assortment of filth from the surrounding areas including banana leaves from the J.S. Tirumana Mandapam, egg shells from bakeries and carcasses of animals including rats, dogs and cats. Leftovers from marriage feasts dumped at the garbage yard attract cattle and dogs,'' she says.

    ``Residents who go to the only temple in the area find it difficult to offer prayers. The swarm of mosquitoes and flies adds to our woes.''

    Residents complained that the garbage was dumped not just from Mahalakshmi Nagar, but from all surrounding areas including Karthikeyapuram, Ram Nagar, Baliah Garden, Puzhithivakkam, Ullagaram, Sadasivan Nagar, Lakshmi Nagar, Kuberan Nagar, Periyar Nagar Extension and Anna Nagar.

    Mr. Srinivasan said repeated complaints to the panchayat chairman met with no response. The association would now take the complaint to the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board, the Health Minister and the Chief Minister's Special Cell. The dumping in the pond started two years ago. Gradually the pond had become a full-fledged dumping site for both organic and inorganic wastes, building rubble and broken trees.

    ``Last year, a transformer got burnt because of the burning garbage,'' he said in his appeal to the Government seeking its intervention.

    The solution would be to dump the garbage on vacant land in other areas, as suggested by panchayat authorities, T. Rathinam, general secretary of the association, said.

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    Rains are going away but IMD looking the other way

    THE INDIAN EXPRESS [9 SEPTEMBER, 2002]
    Ashok B Sharma

    New Delhi, September 8. The satellite maps of the US-based Centre for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies (COLA) indicate that the southwest monsoon is now on its withdrawal course, as it usually happens in the first week of September. But the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), faced with the prospect of a monsoon that won’t be ‘normal’, is ignoring this reality for now.

    IMD Director Dr H D Hatwar says ‘‘there are no symptoms of monsoon withdrawal yet. Usually the monsoon starts withdrawing from the Rajasthan border by the first week of September. This year the monsoon withdrawal may be slightly delayed. We expect some good showers in west Rajasthan in the coming week.’’

    But the fact is that despite some good showers in the past two weeks in different parts of the country, the weathermen are disappointed. The average cumulative rainfall over the country this season till September 4 still remains deficient by 19 per cent. The weathermen are apprehensive that their

    prediction of a ‘normal’ monsoon is likely to fail when the season ends in September. A monsoon gets the ‘normal’ label only when the average cumulative rainfall over the country during the season is within +/- 9 per cent of the normal value of 88 cm. In fact, in the first week of August, the IMD had informed the Government in a confidential report that it was no longer hoping for a ‘normal’ monsoon.

    Additional director-general of IMD Dr SK Srivastav admits that the ‘‘monsoon forecast this year has failed miserably’’ but is quick to add that ‘‘all the global forecast models have equally failed this year. The year has been unique in this respect. There is, therefore, a need to find out factors arising out of global climate change which might have impacted monsoon rain in India.’’

    COLA has in its 10-day short-term forecast valid till September 16 clearly indicated shifting of heavy rainfall clouds to more interior regions of the country, like Uttaranchal, western UP and parts of central MP, Vidarbha and Telengana, between Sept 6 and 11. Gujarat and Rajasthan, from where the monsoon seems to have withdrawn, are likely to receive only 2 mm of rain in that period.

    From Sept 11, western MP, coastal Andhra, Telengana, Sikkim and Tripura are likely to receive moderate to heavy rain while Gujarat, Punjab and HP may receive marginal rain, amounting to a maximum of 20 mm.

    According to COLA, the rainfall in these 10 days in western Rajasthan, eastern Punjab, Ladakh and on the extreme tip of the country will be only 25 pc of the average rainfall received in the region in the same period between 1961 and 1990. However, Uttaranchal, western UP, western MP, Vidarbha, Telengana, and Sikkim will receive moderate to heavy rain, ranging between 150 pc and 300 pc of the average value in the same period.

    By Sept 16, the moisture content in the upper 2-metre top soil will decrease in Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, eastern Rajasthan and eastern Gujarat by at least 2 cm. Gujarat and Rajasthan will experience an increase in temperature by 2 to 4 degree centigrade above normal. Soil moisture will also decrease by 4 cm to 6 cm in eastern MP, Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, parts of Orissa, Jharkhand and Bihar.

    IMD is perturbed with the performance of the monsoon this year. In the first month, June, the rain was normal. In July the situation started deteriorating with the cumulative mid-monsoon rain deficient by 30 pc. In July, the rain was deficient by 49 pc, the lowest in the past 100 years. The deficiency in cumulative rainfall marginally improved to 21 pc in August. Though the rain that month was normal, it wasn’t sufficient to make up for the backlog as it was 3.7 pc below the long period average value.

    Till Sept 4, the average cumulative rainfall had improved to 19 pc below normal. Till date, 17 out of the 35 met subdivisions and 336 out of 523 met districts in the country have received scanty to deficient rainfall.

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