Archived press release

Row over right-to-know on hazardous chemicals

28 November 2002

UN negotiations in Geneva on a new international treaty to improve the public's right to know about pollution are stumbling in the final stages. EU stubbornness at the meeting, due to end this week, is infuriating other delegates who believe that the lack of co-operation will fail to produce the strong right-to-know law expected under the Aarhus "public participation" Convention.

The EU countries are refusing to consider making information available on pollutants in waste, or in waste being sent for disposal. This includes a refusal even to reveal the quantity of polluting heavy metals such as toxic cadmium or mercury in wastes, as suggested by Norway. Millions of tonnes of such wastes are produced every year, threatening human health and creating a need for incinerators and landfill sites.

Friends of the Earth Pollution Researcher, Mary Taylor, speaking for the NGO coalition European ECO Forum, said:

"Reporting pollutants is at the core of a right-to-know system. Without requirements to report substances such as heavy metals in waste, the pollutant register being negotiated as part of this Treaty is becoming less and less valuable. We need to have a systematic pollutant release and transfer register, otherwise the public's access to information will be severely limited."

The EU has also refused to consider the public's right-to-know about toxic chemicals stored at facilities, despite the danger from accidental releases such as those in the floods of this past summer.

Natural Resources Defense Council senior attorney Susan Casey-Lefkowitz said:

"Our right to know must include pollution threats such as stored toxic chemicals. Some of the world's most horrific accidents have come from such industrial storage sites."

It is looking increasingly likely that the negotiations will have to be continued at an unscheduled meeting early next year for the Protocol to be signed by Ministers at the "Environment for Europe" meeting next May. Negotiations continue all this week.

Notes

Delegates are discussing a new protocol under the 1998 Aarhus "public participation" Convention, which will require participating countries to collect and publish information on quantities of pollutants released from certain industrial sources and eventually from diffuse sources such as traffic. The meeting follows a two-year process involving countries from Europe, Central Asia, the US and Canada, as well as representatives from environmental NGOs, including Friends of the Earth, Natural Resources Defense Council and representatives from the chemical industry (CEFIC).

The information will be compiled in to "Pollutant Release and Transfer Registers" or "PRTRs". Such registers are already used in the UK and US and are believed to have helped drive down pollution levels and provided both the public and authorities with useful information.

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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust