Press release
4/2002

Greenpeace files criminal complaint against management Spolana Neratovice
Flooding could wash out poisons from the chemical plant!

Praha/Mělník, 6 February 2002 - Greenpeace today filed a criminal complaint against the management of the chemical factory Spolana in Neratovice, Czech Republic. The environmental organisation declares that people within the management of the firm should face criminal charges because they failed already several years to protect heavily with mercury and dioxins contaminated areas and buildings against possible flooding. In spite of clear evidence of the risks and many repeated warnings, the management of Spolana refuses to take defensive measures against possible high water levels. When the poison would wash out to the Elbe River, this would, according to experts, endanger the environment as well as public health (1).

"The management of Spolana so far ignored all calls for securing the buildings, even though their own study concludes that the with dioxins contaminated building number A 1030 will already be flooded with 50 centimetres of water in case of a once in a 50 years flood," warned Dr. Miroslav Suta, coordinator of the toxics programme of Greenpeace in the Czech Republic.

The management of Spolana argues at present with a new "dynamic flooding model", that it nevertheless refuses to publish. In reaction to the claim of Spolana, the Czech Inspectorate for the Environment (CIZP) informed Greenpeace that this model study has not yet been concluded, and furthermore that its present results indicate a similar risk on flooding of the buildings as described above. (2)

At Spolana not only two heavily with dioxins contaminated buildings are endangered, but also parts of the production area that are contaminated with extremely high concentrations of mercury. These originate from old amalgam electrolysis installations that have been abandoned over 25 years ago without any form of maintenance. In this area several tens of thousands cubic metres of soil are contaminated with over 250 tons of elementary mercury and its organic and inorganic compounds. According to documentation available at the Czech Ministry of Environment the mercury-contaminated area would already flood in a once in 20 year flood. (3)

"Failing to protect these areas and buildings against possible flooding has to be classified as endangering the public and endangering the environment in the sense of the Czech criminal law," stresses Suta. "Dioxins are carcinogenic substances that already threaten the human immune and hormone systems in the smallest amounts. Also mercury is extremely dangerous for human health and the aquatic ecosystem of the Elbe River. Long-term exposure to small amounts of mercury can even effect the human brain," concludes Suta (4).

Další informace:

Dr. Miroslav Suta, coordinator toxics campaign mobile: +420.603.443 140 (Czech and English),
e-mail: miroslav.suta@cz.greenpeace.org
Vaclav Vasku, press spokes person, mobile: +420.603.414 739 (Czech and English)
Jan Haverkamp, campaign director, mobile: +420.603.569 243 (English and German),
e-mail: jan.haverkamp@cz.greenpeace.org


internet: http://www.greenpeace.cz/agentorange



Notes for the editor:
(1) Aquatest: Spolana a.s. Neratovice - Kontaminace objekti A 1420 a A 1030 dioxiny - Analyza rizika - zaverecna zprava (Contamination of the objects A 1420 and A 1030 with dioxins - Risk analysis - final report), January 2001
(2) Letter of the Czech Inspectorate for the Environment (CIZP) to Greenpeace, dd. 17 January 2002 (copy available from the Greenpeace office in Prague)
(3) Ekosystem: Documentation on the assessment of building activties on the environment (EIA), Building activities - decontamination of the old amalgam electrolysis structures, Prague, April 2001 (Ekosystem: Dokumentace o hodnoceni vlivu stavby na zivotni prostredi (EIA), Stavba - sanace stare amalgamove elektrolyzy)
(4) People that have been exposed to mercury have been reported to suffer headaches, dizziness, loss of weight, and digestion malfunctions. It also causes long term tremors of fingers, lips, tongue and eyelids, which spread further to hands and legs. See e.g. Bencko, Cikrt, Lener: Toxicke kovy v zivotnim a pracovnim prostredi cloveka (Toxic metals in environmental and occupational healt), Grada 1995.