Arpi Harutyunyan, Armenianow
Alaverdi gets the lion share of sulfur dioxide exhausts
Research centers of Norway and Sweden say 45,000 tons of sulfur dioxide accumulate on the territory of Armenia every year with 25,000 tons being from mining industry exhaust.
“We have almost totally used the resources of mining in Armenia, but the state continues to promote whatever is left to give foreign investors an even broader field to exploit the mines of Armenia and spoil nature,” says Vahagn Israelyan, geodesist at the National Academy of Sciences pointing to the exploitation of gold mines in Zod and Drmbon as well as the Teghut mine.
The lion’s stake of sulfur dioxide equal to 23,000 tons belongs to the copper smelting plant in Alaverdi of the ACP Company. This company also exploits the Teghut mine, a controversial site for the environmentalists.
“The sulfur in this town exceeds the permitted limit 11.6 times. And I am forced to send a message to the ministry every Monday pointing to the fact,” says deputy director of the “Ecomonitoring” state non-trade organization Seyran Minasyan.
Former Minister of Environmental Protection Vardan Ayvazyan often claimed that the ministry had forced the company to install filters. And Andranik Ghambaryan, representative of ACP told ArmeniaNow reporters in 2005 the filters were to be installed soon, which, however did never take place. The scenario repeats this time under the Minister Aram Harutyunyan.
For several years already environmentalists call the situation a crisis as the sulfur is considered as highly hazardous for human health especially the respiratory and reproductive organs.
The acid rainfalls on the territories neighboring the copper plants – composed of precipitations and toxic agents – move to broader areas harming or destroying the water basin there and its ecosystem.
According to “Ecomonitoring” there is no soil observation station in Armenia yet; therefore it is impossible to get any picture of the situation.
“We need at least 260 stations today to survey the soil,” says Minasyan. “There were 19 of them to monitor the air basin in 6 settlements in the Soviet times. Only 11 were remaining in 2003. At present there are 13 operating in 6 settlements – Yerevan, Alaverdi, Vanadzor, Gyumri, Hrazdan and Ararat. An air monitoring has been set in operation in Tsakhkadzor in 2003.”
Hakob Sanasaryan, the chairman of the Greens’ Union believes Tsakhkadzor, a resort town, is one of those settlements, where the illegal alienation of forest lands and construction works result in environmental crisis.
“About 180 hectares of land have recently been alienated in Tsakhkadzor with 6 of them given to Davit Lokyan (former Minister of Agriculture), and an equal amount to Armen Gevorgyan (Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Territorial Administration) and Hovik Abrahamyan (Head of Presidential Administration) each, as well as 2 hectares to Martin Matevosyan, director of “Hyeantar” state non-trade organization.”
Reflecting on the distribution of forest areas Sanasaryan says about 40 hectares of rapidly growing poplar plantation were similarly given to the former Minister Vardan Khachatryan’s mother-in-law Ruzan Mkrtchyan.
Karen Afrikyan, botanist at the Armenian Forests NGO says the territory once belonged to the Botanic Institute. The water basin directly tied up to the rest of the environment is also in the focus of Afrikyan’s concerns.
“The lower part of the Hrazdan River is quite contaminated. We have problems on the section of the River Voghji outside Kapan, River Debed outside Ahktala, where metals like copper, vanadium, iron and selenium predominate,” says Minasyan adding the water basin observation network covers 48 rivers, 6 reservoirs and lakes including Sevan. Each sample measures the water quality in regard to 30-60 characteristics.
“The quality of water is decided depending on the purpose of its use. Of course, there are many concerning things – the conditions do not comply with the set norms for fish industry. In some cases the amount of metals exceeds the norms. In the River Hrazdan outside Yerevan there are naturally generated pollutants, because the Yerevan sewage pours into the river without undergoing cleaning. We send a telegram to the Minister every month on the amount of ammonium ions and nitrates,” says Minasyan speaking also of the air basin monitoring that shows the most polluted is the air in Alaverdi and the center of Yerevan.
Specialists insist, however, they need at least 14 observation stations (instead of the 5 operating now) in Yerevan to do a monitoring in accord with European standards. Each of the stations costs about 100,000 Euros. There is just one in Gyumri instead of the necessary 3. And there are no such stations in industrial towns like Kapan and Kajaran.
“In the Soviet times the monitoring was a sort of passive evaluation of situation by means of supervision. Today there is a new demand for information for efficient management of the environment particularly the water quality. The new doctrine on monitoring adopted in 2006 provides also for information analysis,” mentions Minasyan adding about 190 million drams ($ 629,139) have been invested by the government in 2007-2008 to purchase new equipment.
July 18, 2008