Way seen to end steel smelting plant related disputes

[Karl]

Way seen to end steel smelting plant related disputes

Bangkok Post – Tuesday July 01, 2008

Rising tensions between giant steel manufacturer Sahaviriya and local villagers in Prachuap Khiri Khan can be defused by having local villagers take part in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) consideration process, says the National Human Rights Commission.

Conflicts between those opposed to Sahaviriya's smelting plant in Bang Saphan district and the firm over the past few years have led to several violent clashes between the locals and the project supporters. Commissioner Sunee Chaiyarose said allowing villagers who are adversely affected by the investment project to have a say in the EIA process would be an effective tool in discouraging future confrontations between the two sides.

People's participation in any decision-making process involving a project that can impact their livelihoods is demanded under article 67 of the constitution, she said. If allowed to build, the smelting plant would impact negatively on the villagers' lives, health, and the surrounding environment, she said. Buntoon Srethasirote, director of the NHRC's strategic policy on natural resources-based project, said that locals should be given full access to the project developer's EIA report so that they know to what degree it would impact their lives and communities. ''The EIA approval process should no longer be confidential. It should be made public.''

Under the law, the Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning is in charge of the EIA screening and consideration process before forwarding the report for the National Environment Board's approval. The NEB is chaired by the prime minister. The NHRC earlier asked Sahaviriya to disclose the project's EIA report, but the firm refused, saying it contained confidential information about the firm's investment and production procedures. Meanwhile, Bang Saphan villager Witoon Buaroi, who led a local protest against the smelting plant recently, said: ''The experts should not just sit in the office and read the company's paper. They should visit the project site to see what is really going on.''

Harnarong Yaowaloes, of the National Economic and Social Advisory Board, said when he was asked to review the 600-page EIA report, he found that it lacked clear measures on how to mitigate the project's environment impacts. Sahaviriya Steel Group recently resubmitted the EIA report for its 90-billion-baht steel smelter after the company revised its first version to exclude the controversial wetland areas claimed by the villagers as the most pristine swamp in the district. However, villagers are afraid the project will destroy the fragile ecological system of the wetland and have vowed to continue opposing the project.

Source: Bangkok Post | General news | Way seen to end steel smelting plant related disputes

[natureguy]

In india there have been many similar issues. I think that this issue can be solved by interference of government only.

1) If these plants are put up in areas near residence, its emission would harm the residents.

2) If these plants are put up in some remote region away from any human residence, then how does one expect to run the plant? People are required to run these factories so they will have to run vehicles that bring their labourers from nearby areas. Now this would add to emissions as well as cost of the end products.

Actually solution should be use of green technologies in capping emissions from this factories.

[Karl]

Originally Posted by natureguy

In india there have been many similar issues. I think that this issue can be solved by interference of government only.

1) If these plants are put up in areas near residence, its emission would harm the residents.

2) If these plants are put up in some remote region away from any human residence, then how does one expect to run the plant? People are required to run these factories so they will have to run vehicles that bring their labourers from nearby areas. Now this would add to emissions as well as cost of the end products.

Actually solution should be use of green technologies in capping emissions from this factories.

The irony is that in Trinidad & Tobago, there has recently been conflicts between communities and a steel company from India - Essar Steel. At the moment, Essar is seeking permission to build another steel plant – but they are having major obstacles from protests by fishermen since in order to build a port for the plant they need to remove vast acreages of mangrove from the coastline. They are required by the “no-net-loss” policy to replant mangrove elsewhere, but that will not help the fishermen.

·The Trinidad Guardian -Online Edition Ver 2.0 (Saith assures anti steel mill protesters: Mangrove will be replaced)

·The Trinidad Guardian -Online Edition Ver 2.0 (Essar: Steel plant will be built)

·InternationalReports.net : Trinidad & Tobago 2005

[natureguy]

Sad. Very sad.

[Karl]

Originally Posted by natureguy

2) If these plants are put up in some remote region away from any human residence, then how does one expect to run the plant? People are required to run these factories so they will have to run vehicles that bring their labourers from nearby areas. Now this would add to emissions as well as cost of the end products.

The other aspect to this issue, is that the more remote areas (with less population) usually have more "pristine" environments, and instead of pollution affecting villagers, the issues raised against the industrial developments are then related to forests, biodiversity and endangered species. It always becomes a trade-off between "not in my backyard" and "not in my nature reserve".

But rather than aiming for piecemeal or over-compartmentalised solutions (as is usually attempted), what is really needed in cases like these is a return to a more genuine implementation of established concepts of "eco-efficiency" (which has lost much credibility via the modern day "greenwashing"); further to this, in the case of properly controlled development of heavy industries, there is need for the more-encompassing frameworks of "Industrial Ecology" and "Symbiotic Industrial Parks" to be re-examined.

Those ideas have been around for some time, in fact there was an earlier thread posted on this forum by Abhishek on that topic: (Industrial Symbiosis & Industrial Ecology)

There is no reason why these concepts should not be integrated more meaningfully into the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) process for industrial development. However these ideas have never been too popular with traditional industrialists (for reasons that are probably beyond the scope of this thread).