the Baykal again in danger, and at once from two parties. Former chemical plant from Usolye’s going to poison the lake millions of tons of mercury and chlorine, and plans to modernize the railway was fraught with clear felling of forests along the coast. Both issues were on the agenda of the meeting Putin at the initiative of the head of the Irkutsk region Kobzeva. The elimination of ecological threats, Putin took under personal control.
On Thursday, President Vladimir Putin held a meeting on the threat of environmental disaster in the Irkutsk region. At the meeting, which was appointed with the filing of the acting head of the region Igor Kobzev, also meeting Vice-Premier of Victoria Abramchenko, which oversees the environment, the Minister of natural resources Dmitry Kobylkin, head of the Ministry of emergency situations Evgeny Senichev and defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.
The main item on the agenda was the situation in the Irkutsk city of Usolye-Siberian. As Putin said, the burden of environmental problems accumulated in the city since 1930-ies.
“In this area, worked for a major chemical company, and now the situation is such that the storage chemical wastes are in poor condition. Honestly to say, this one really was not engaged never, moreover, this problem, instead of solve, essentially, is actually suppressed,” – said the head of state.
We will remind, Usol’e-Sibirskoe – one of the oldest cities in the Angara region with a population of 76 thousand people. It is included in the list of Russian cities with the most polluted air. The plant “Usoliekhimprom” in 1936 was one of the largest enterprise of the chemical industry. The salt mine provided the plant with raw materials. In the 1990-ies the situation with eco-safety has sharply deteriorated, the waste began an opportunity to stuff into various containers and place them around the perimeter of the enterprise. In addition, the waste is simply poured into deep wells, formed in the extraction of salt. In 2010 the company went bankrupt.
According to Kobzev, the site was over 600 acres. But after stopping production a significant part of the waste was placed in the underground tanks and abandoned. Now all of the soil and groundwater around soaked in hazardous chemicals. Earlier Rosatom jointly with the emergencies Ministry and Rosprirodnadzor conducted a survey, which proves that the area of the ecological disaster contaminated with mercury, chlorine compounds and other hazardous substances. The total size of contaminated area is about 16 sq km, has accumulated about 2 million tons of industrial waste.
The head of state said that the defense Ministry is ready to work in Usol’ye-Sibirskoye to eliminate environmental pollution. With the authority of a single vendor for all works to eliminate the environmental problems ��on the orders of Putin, transferred to Rosatom.
The Chairman of the all-Russian society of nature protection (VOOP) Elmurod Rasulmukhamedov after the meeting said the newspaper VIEW that there is “immediate danger of falling of pollutants into the Hangar”.
“And it’s a bunch of lake Baikal, is a threat to Irkutsk. There is a danger not only for nature but also for people”,
he said. The fact that clear Usolye-Sibirskoye has been entrusted to nuclear industry expert is not surprising, because several years ago, Rosatom has created a subsidiary, which in the framework of the national project “Ecology” has instructed to eliminate the problems associated with chemical waste, particularly mercury. Rosatom, according to Rasulmuhamedova, gathered a competent team, he developed technologies that can be successfully applied. Moreover, a subsidiary of Rosatom “for a very short period of time have developed quite a large amount of work on recultivation of the landfill in Chelyabinsk”.
Irkutsk ecologist Denis Bukalov believes that the difficulty lies in the poor knowledge of the underground storage Usolye specialists. “Today, even many professionals completely unknown that there is,” said Bukalov the newspaper VIEW. Environmentalist welcomed the fact that the problem took under the personal control of Putin. “Before, at the level of heads of the region was also mentioned that environmental issues will be addressed, but all this was stopped. But once this was stated by the President himself, I hope that there will be positive developments,” said Bukalov.
When at the end of last year, acting Governor of the Irkutsk region became Kobzeva, who previously worked as the Deputy head of the EMERCOM of Russia, in his first speech he raised the issue of “Usoliekhimprom”, calling the platform “ecological time bomb, reported by “Komsomolskaya Pravda – Irkutsk”. After that, the solution to the problem moved from a dead point.
Following the meeting, Putin instructed the government within three months to approve an action plan to eliminate pollution of the environment in Usolye-Sibirskoye. The President also ordered the Ministry of health to provide medical care to the employees of the organizations performing works on elimination of environmental pollution.
On Thursday evening the Chairman of the Investigative Committee Alexander Bastrykin has instructed to conduct pre-investigation checks on the fact of violation of the rules of handling and storage of hazardous waste in Usolye-Sibirskoye, gave TASS. The head of the UK demanded the test to establish involved in the incident, and to determine the damage to the environment.
At the meeting with Putin was also talking about protection of Baikal shores. Kobzev encouraged to prevent the mass logging near the lake. The acting reminded approved last week by the Council of the Federation the amendment to the law “On protection of lake Baikal”, DOP��sousou clear cutting on forest lands.
“This rule has caused considerable public outcry and the concerns of the residents of the Irkutsk region. We understand the importance of economic development of the country in General and transport infrastructure in particular, said Kobzev. “However, we cannot ignore the need to balance economic and environmental interests, especially in matters concerning lake Baikal”, – he added.
The development of infrastructure Railways could damage the ecology of the Irkutsk region and on Baikal people come from all over the country. And Kobzev has shown himself as a defender of nature, referring the matter to the President, said the newspaper VIEW, political analyst Daria Kislitsyna.
Kobzev made to study in detail this question, the political scientist said. “He asked Vladimir Putin to instruct the Russian Railways jointly with the authorities of the Irkutsk region, the scientific and environmental community to prepare further proposals on how to implement the bill without harming the ecosystem of lake Baikal. The President supported this request,” – said Kislitsyna.
