EMA boss talks tough
Newsday Reporter - April 11 2006
We will enforce TT green laws
THE Environment Management Authority (EMA) flexed its muscles during a Joint Select Committee meeting in Parliament yesterday, when the authority’s CEO Dr David Mc Intosh, declared that no smelter will be built in the country, unless the companies involved — ALCOA and Alutrint — adhere to local environmental standards.
Mc Intosh made this bold statement in the presence of representatives from Alutrint, which has a 60 percent stake by government and which wants to set up the smaller of two smelters in the country. No representative of ALCOA was present yesterday.
Officials from the Energy Ministry, National Gas Company and the National Energy Corporation, were part of the Joint Select Committee meeting on the proposed aluminium smelters, which was chaired by Independent Senator Mary King.
Mc Intosh’s announcement came after Alutrint’s communications manager Clement James said the pre-baked process used by third generation smelters, which the company plans to use in TT, was environmentally safer since the fluoride emissions were less.
But the EMA CEO said: “whatever kind of bake, whether pre-baked or post-baked, if the companies do not meet our environmental standards, no Certificate of Environmental Clearance (CEC) will be granted. At the end of the day, the CEC rules.”
Noting that public consultation will help decide if the companies get CECs, Mc Intosh said the EMA has already put out Alutrint’s Environmental Impact Assessment or EIA.
“The only application before us is Alutrint’s. ALCOA’s application for a CEC was incomplete and the EMA has returned it to them.” He said the EIA tells what would be discharged from the smelter, a solid waste containing hazardous substances like cyanide and silicon, air pollutants like fluoride, and liquid waste. It also tells how the company plans to dispose of them.
“We would expect any proposed smelter in the country to meet our standards, and if they don’t, no CEC can be issued,” Mc Intosh said.
He further added, “I’m sure the proponents are fully aware of the standards our country has set to protect its citizens and its flora and fauna.”
Mc Intosh said Alutrint’s EIA, which is out for public comment and would go until April 28, is a very transparent process and he’s encouraging citizens to look at it.
He said hydrogen fluoride in high concentrations, can negatively affect cattle, and cause a brittle bone disease in humans.
But while the EMA has air and water pollution standards, legislation is yet to be enacted to give them teeth, the EMA CEO said.
“The EMA has submitted strategic plans to Cabinet concerning these rules and we expect them to be passed so we can begin to deal with existing plants,” he said.
SOURCE:
http://www.newsday.co.tt/news/0,35781.html