Toxic Waste kept for Safe Disposal in Bharuch Catches Fire
A Fire at a facility especially set up to safely store and dispose of hazardous waste at Ankleshwar in Bharuch district of Gujarat has revealed how callously dangerous waste is managed in the country. In what could have been an industrial disaster worse than the Bhopal gas tragedy, 250 tonnes of hazardous chemicals and oil kept in barrels at Bharuch Enviro Infrastructure Limited (beil)—of which pesticide giant United Phosphorus is a major equity shareholder—went up in smoke on the evening of April 3. The godown had stored over 12,800 tonnes of hazardous chemical solvents and waste oil, which far exceed the capacity of its incinerator.
“Had it not been for the change in wind direction within 10 minutes of the fire, it could have spread to and destroyed all the nearby factories in the Gujarat Industrial Development Corporation (gidc) and villages”
says Manoj Kotadia, manager, fire and safety, Disaster Prevention and Management Centre, Ankleshwar. Continue reading »
Filed under Environment, India, Pollution, Travel | Tags: Bharuch, Chemical Industry, Chemical Leakages, Gujarat, Hazardous Industry, Hazardous Waste, Health Effects, India, Legislation, Pesticide Industry, Waste Disposal, Waste Incineration | Comment (0)No Return of The Native
Wizened old Jidemadamma has to depend on her neighbours for meals. Her son and daughter-in-law have gone to Kodagu to collect pepper from trees and will not be back before two weeks. They took the children along because I cannot move around much. Earlier, all of us stayed together here. Now there is nobody, says the septuagenarian, sitting outside her hut in Kaneri Colony, one of the 62 hamlets in Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple (BRT) Wildlife Sanctuary in southern Karnataka.
Jidemadamma is among the few Soligas, an indigenous community, left in the hamlet. Soligas, literally meaning the bamboo children, are known for their environment-friendly practices and sustainable collection of minor forest produce. But most have migrated in search of livelihood since the government banned collection of non-timber forest produce ‘honey, lichen, amla, soapberry and soapnut’ their main source of income, about two years ago. Same is the story in other hamlets inside the sanctuary in the Western Ghats. Continue reading »
Filed under Environment, India, Travel, WildLife | Tags: Forest Fires, Forest Policy, Forest Products, Forest Rights Act 2006, India, Karnataka, Lantana, Legislation, Migration, Minor Forest Produce, Sanctuaries, Tribals, Western Ghats | Comment (0)MOEF Defination of Waste, Material etc. Skewed
The terms ‘waste‘ and ‘material‘ are synonymous in the draft hazardous material rules of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (moef). The rules have been criticized for violating norms of the Basel Convention – an international treaty on cleaner production, minimization of hazardous waste and control on its movement—to which India is a signatory.
“The rather unusual use of two similar meaning yet different terms—waste and material—is bound to lead to enormous confusion,’ note D B Boralkar and Claude Alvares, members of the Supreme Court Monitoring Committee on Hazardous Wastes and say that the state pollution control boards won’t be able to deal with the confusion. Continue reading »
Filed under Environment, Pollution, Save environment | Tags: * Government Of India (GOI), Hazardous Industry, Hazardous Products, India, Legislation, Ministry Of Environment And Forests (MOEF), Supreme Court, Toxic Wastes, Waste Disposal | Comment (0)