BPPM’s Legacy: A town in crisis and a landscape of industrial waste
June 9th, 2009
Baikal Explorer
By Bella Gordon
The Baikalsk Pulp and Paper Mill (BPPM), as the only industrial facility located at the shore and discharging its waste directly into Baikal, has been a touchstone issue for Russian environmental movement since 1958, when plans for its construction first became public. On October 2nd, 2008, after 50 years of attempts to retrofit or close it, BPPM finally ceased operation! It did so, however, in the worst possible way, without a day’s warning or preparation.
The mill was Baikalsk’s one source of jobs, tax revenue, and important infrastructure services. With its close, former employees were left unemployed and without even the salaries and unemployment benefits they were legally entitled to. Last week, four former employees declared a hunger strike until all back-pay is distributed. On June 8th, BPPM workers were finally paid for the months of February, March, and April. Despite efforts by the Irkutsk oblast’ administration, only a small percentage of former workers were able to find jobs elsewhere. A number of Baikalsk families are already relying on food baskets and emergency aid provided by the government. Some speculate that if matters are not improved soon a wave of criminal activity and even riots (blocking the trans-continental railroad is mentioned) are possible.
Meanwhile, the BPPM compound and surrounding landscape remains plagued with a number of pollution sources. The compound is home to as yet un-inventoried dangerous chemical reagents, intermediate products, and waste. For example, 900 tons of highly alkaline pulp liquor is being stored in drums that according to Irkutsk oblast Rosprirodnadzor are leaking.
Fourteen huge uncovered dumpsites of industrial waste (primarily sludge lignin, lignin ash, and coal ash) cover 180 hectares by the rivers Babha and Bol’shaya Osinovka. The dumpsites are under a number of short and long term threats including floods, mudflows, and earthquakes, that could result in situations in which their contents fall into Baikal. Moreover, despite the dumpsites being lined, some groundwater contamination has already been observed. Measures BPPM has been responsible for (i.e. continual monitoring, bi-annual draining of surplus water to prevent floods) are no longer being carried out.
Yet another serious source of pollution to Baikal is the severely contaminated groundwater under the main polygon. Contamination occurred when the canals carrying chemical solutions inside the pulp “cooking” shop lost their hermetical seal and were allowed to leak for years. In lieu of fixing the canals, BPPM was allowed to build a system of 8 remediation wells to pump and treat the groundwater. The efficiency of the wells was always highly in doubt, but with the cessation of operation at BPPM all pumping and treatment has stopped. The time span in which the remaining contaminants will empty out into Baikal making further treatment attempts useless, is a question scientists have yet to answer.
The cost of pollution remediation is not yet known, but some quote values on the order of $100 million-$250 million. Legal liability or even the government agency responsible for managing accumulated pollution is literally undetermined in the Russian law base. In May the Irkutsk region appealed to the federal Ministry of Natural Resources to finance clean-up. The minister responded that he thought costs should be shared between MNR, region, and owner.
With each government agency trying to claim as little responsibility as possible, and many precedents of severely polluted sites going without remediation, there is cause for pessimism. Seen from a different angle, however, it is a rallying cry for action by civil society. Baikal and BPPM are, after all, the most famous of Russian environmental issues. Without such attention the complicated and expensive problem is bound to sink from view and from action on the part of the government.
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