IPS-English PERU: Pollution Emergency Plan Instead of Real
 
Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2007 15:56:05 -0700



PERU: Pollution Emergency Plan Instead of Real Action for La 
Oroya Milagros Salazar* - Tierramérica

LIMA, Aug 10   (IPS)  - Far from halting the source that is 
poisoning the Andean city of La Oroya, which is home to the Doe 
Run smelting complex, the Peruvian government ordered a 
contingency plan for the days when air pollution is worst, as if 
it were dealing with a natural disaster.

The Contingency Plan for States of Alert will be presented Aug. 
10 by the government's national environmental council, CONAM, 
which approved it Jul. 18 to protect the 35,000 inhabitants of La 
Oroya from the sulphur dioxide, lead and cadmium emissions from 
the Doe Run smokestacks.

The plan is the result of two years of debates involving citizen 
groups, non-governmental organisations and the state agencies in 
charge of carrying it out, as well as representatives of the 
company, which will provide much of the financing.

La Oroya, 180 kilometres east of Lima, is one of the country's 13 
most polluted cities, the government said in 2001. The New 
York-based Blacksmith Institute in 2006 included it in a list of 
the 10 worst cases in the world.

CONAM regional coordinator Carlos Rojas told Tierramérica there 
will be three levels of alert: watch, danger and emergency, 
according to which actions will be taken to limit the exposure of 
the affected population and partially halt two production lines 
of lead and copper at Doe Run.

The degree of alert will be determined based on air quality and 
weather forecasts unfavourable to dispersal of the gases and 
particulates away from the city, such as lower temperatures and 
lack of wind. But none of the three levels entails ceasing 
operations at the smelting plant, Rojas said.

Once a state of alert is ordered, it will be recommended that the 
most vulnerable -- children, pregnant women, the elderly and 
people with respiratory or cardiovascular illnesses -- should not 
be outdoors between 9:00 am and 1:00 pm local time, the worst 
period of the day for exposure.

Doors and windows of homes, schools and hospitals should be 
closed, and food sold on the street should be covered.

The population in general should cover mouth and nose with 
scarves and handkerchiefs when outside. The idea of facemasks was 
ruled out because ”people don't want images that further 
dramatise the situation,” said Rojas.

Asked about Doe Run's contribution to the contingency plan, a 
company source told Tierramérica that it has been applying 
stop-work measures voluntarily since 2000.

The stoppages affect two plants identified as the ones producing 
the greatest volume of sulphur dioxide: sintering (to produce 
bullion) and copper conversion. In the first case, reducing the 
input of sulphur, and in the second, halting one or several 
copper foundries, according to the company.

But ”the cost of the actions involved in the implementation of 
the contingency plan for each of the actors involved has not yet 
been determined,” said the source.

The gases and particulate matter affect people's eyes and 
breathing, and can cause lung-related ailments. Furthermore, the 
accumulation of heavy metals like lead in the body, especially in 
children, is a factor in growth and learning disorders, and 
chronic illnesses.

The Doe Run complex's main chimney emits an average of 1.5 tonnes 
of lead and 810 tonnes of sulphur dioxide every 24 hours -- more 
than four times the maximum allowed under Peruvian legislation, 
which is 175 tonnes per day of sulphur dioxide, according to the 
Ministry of Energy and Mines.

The same day that CONAM approved the plan, the level of sulphur 
dioxide recorded over the course of three hours was 12,000 
micrograms of sulphur dioxide per cubic metre of air, when the 
air quality standard only allows 364 micrograms.

Tests also found 330 micrograms per cubic metre of air a 
composite that includes lead, cadmium and arsenic -- twice the 
level allowed under air quality standards.

Medical studies by the non-governmental CooperAcción in 1999 and 
2003 and by the U.S. University of Missouri-St. Louis in 2005 
found that most of the children under age six had more than 40 
micrograms of lead per decilitre of blood (mcg/dl), four times 
more than the 10 mcg/dl established as the maximum by the World 
Health Organisation.

In its first four months, the contingency plan will be centred on 
the reduction of emissions, and then will shift towards measures 
involving residents, through an information campaign.

The city of La Oroya depends on Doe Run for economic survival, as 
most residents depend directly or indirectly on the smelting 
complex for work.

Mayor César Gutiérrez, unlike his predecessor, has supported the 
alert programme since he took office this year. ”It is necessary 
to protect ourselves until the company complies with reducing 
pollution,” he told Tierramérica.

Furthermore, he has called on the mining investment supervisory 
body to report the results of the audit conducted on Doe Run at 
the beginning of the year. But its president, Alfredo Dammert, 
told Tierramérica that this month it will be announced if there 
will be sanctions against the company, mainly for emissions of 
sulphur dioxide that it was required to reduce by 2007.

The company assures that emissions of particulate matter have 
been reduced since the complex began operations in 1997 from 147 
micrograms to 73 micrograms per cubic metre of air. The maximum 
allowed by law is 100 micrograms.

Doe Run also maintains that it has curbed sulphur dioxide 
emissions by 20 percent.

But according to CONAM, the emission of this toxic agent is a 
matter of concern. If the contingency plan were CONAM already in 
place, a state of emergency would have been declared 183 days so 
far this year.

(*Originally published by Latin American newspapers that are part 
of the Tierramérica network. Tierramérica is a specialised news 
service produced by IPS with the backing of the United Nations 
Development Programme and the United Nations Environment 
Programme.)


***** + Tierramérica (http://www.tierramerica.info/index_en.php) 
+ CONAM - Peru's National Environmental Council 
(http://www.conam.gob.pe/Modulos/Home/index.asp) + Doe Run 
(http://www.doerun.com/) + PERU: Gasping for Clean Air in La 
Oroya (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=35822) + PERU: Company 
Offers Band-Aid Solutions to a Polluted Town 
(http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=35846)


(END/IPS/LA/EN HE DV CV HD/TRASP-LD/MS/TA/07)


 
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