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Publish date: July 4, 2007
News
The event marked the launch of the new Greenpeace project “Chistaya Neva” (Clean Neva), aimed at improving the water quality in the Neva and preventing further pollution of the river. In spite of existing programs to decrease the amount of pollution in the Neva, levels of pollutants have continued to grow over the last years. In autumn 2006 and spring 2007 Greenpeace examined a few of the drains leading into the Neva and discovered more than 200 outlets of contaminated drainage water. A detailed analysis of one of the water samples, collected from a drain on Vyborgskaya Nabereshnaya, showed that the concentration of copper in the water was 73 times over the allowed limit, and the concentration of manganese was 26 times over.
The fish in the Neva, according to a Greenpeace survey, contain high levels of arsenic and polychlorbiphenyl – one of the 12 most dangerous persistent organic pollutants (POPs). In all samples of fish from the Neva, levels of polychlorbiphenyl exceeded the EU norms for food products. To address these problems, Greenpeace will do a study of the water quality in the river and in drains coming from different companies, and publish the results for the citizens of St. Petersburg. A specially equipped Greenpeace vessel will traffic on the Neva during the course of this project. It will also be used to track down hazardous waste, most of which still remains undocumented and unpunished.
Recent attacks on Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant "mark the beginning of a new and gravely dangerous front of the war," the UN atomic agency's director general said last week.
After years of inaction, Germany is working on its Carbon Management Strategy to resolve how CCS can play a role in climate action in industry. At the end of February, the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action published first key points and a proposal to amend the law Kohlenstoffdioxid Speicherungsgesetz (KSpG). Bellona Deutschland, who was actively involved in the previous stakeholder dialogue submitted a statement in the association hearing.
In the midst of a global discussion on whether natural gas should be used as a transitional fuel and whether emissions from its extraction, production, transport and use are significantly less than those from other fossil fuels, Russia has developed ambitious plans to increase its own production of liquified natural gas (LNG) in the Arctic – a region with 75% of proven gas reserves in Russia – to raise its share in the international gas trade.
In this news digest, we monitor events that impact the environment in the Russian Arctic. Our main focus lies in identifying the factors that contribute to pollution risks and climate change.