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TOUR
LOGBOOK
18 April 2000 - Greenpeace boards shipment of US Toxic Military Waste
in Yokohama, Japan.
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This
morning just after 8:00 am the MV Wanhe carrying US military PCB
waste arrived at Yokohama. Two Greenpeace inflatables with banners
were there escorting it and protesting its arrival, while dodging
about seven or eight police boats.
Read a personal account from one of the
climbers. |
After
arrival at the wharf around 8:30, the activists from Japan, the
USA and two from Canada boarded the ship. After boarding the ship,
the team of four women displayed a banner reading "USA - Toxic Criminal".
The boats and drivers (from the UK,Tunisia and Japan) were detained
by the police, but eventually they were let off by the police with
a warning. |
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The
four activists remained on the ship for 10 hours. Two chained themselves
on top of the PCB waste containers while two others locked themselves
to the rail on the deck. Police, the captain of the ship, and most recently
US Embassy officials negotiated with the activists all day.
As a result of this and previous actions against this shipment the Japanese
US Embassy issued the following statement:
"A shipment of waste material containing low levels of PCB's (polychlorinated
biphenyls) from U.S. Military bases in Japan and sent to Canada for
disposal returned temporarily to the port of Yokohama today. The fourteen
containers of waste material will be offloaded and stored by the Defense
Logistics Agency in an appropriate and safe manner for no more than
one month before they will be reshipped out of Japan for ecologically
sound treatment. "
The US government has now committed to "ecologically sound treatment"
and for the first time recognised the problem of this PCB waste. However
the lack of certainty over the intended destination and actual disposal
method for the waste leaves many questions unanswered.
Polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) are highly toxic chemical compounds
whose production has been banned worldwide. There are still vast amounts
of PCBs in use in transformers and other electrical equipment.
This PCB waste is generated by the United States military at their bases
in Japan and the United States and are therefore to be held responsible
for the environmentally sound detoxification of this PCB waste shipment
(and the many other PCB stockpiles at their (former) military bases).
Greenpeace has sent a fax to the US ambassador in Japan inviting him
to the Wanhe in Yokohama to take responsibility over the shipment.
This includes:
(a) No Incineration: it needs to be disposed of using non-incineration,
closed loop technology. Incineration of the PCB waste will give rise
to dioxin and other toxic emissions. Promising non-incineration technologies
already exist and are being used for example to clean
up of hazardous wastes dumped at the 2000 Olympics site at Homebush
Bay, Sydney, Australia.
More information on technical criteria for the destruction of PCB's
and other POPs can be found in the Greenpeace report "Technical Criteria
for the Destruction of Stockpiled Persistent Organic Pollutants" Read
the summary
or download the report
(pdf file).
(b) Community Rights: It is crucial that proper controls and community
input is gained before such operations are initiated. Any treatment
of waste must therefor have community oversight and participation in
decision making and be tightly regulated by the relevant authorities.
This also means that full disclosure of the content of the wastes should
be made public. This must include PCB concentration data and must include
polychlorinated dioxins and furans, substances that are known byproducts
in PCB mixtures.
Greenpeace condemned the US government for trying to illegally ship
this hazardous PCB waste into Canada earlier this month. Read the full
story here. The shipment was denied entry into Canada because the
company contracted to treat the waste, Trans Cycle Industries (TCI)
of Kirkland Lake, Ontario, had been refused an import permit by the
Ontario authorities in December 1999.
TCI use a solvent washing process to remove the PCBs from metal wastes.
The PCB waste was planed to be sent for incineration at the Bovar
incinerator in Swan Hills, Alberta (Canada). As a result of the
incineration of PCB and other hazardous wastes at Swan Hills, the authorities
have advised local indigenous peoples not to consume wildlife from within
30 km of the incinerator.
(c) Polluter Pays: The cost of PCB waste disposal and decontamination
of waste sites needs to be fully paid for by the polluter, the United
States military.
The toxic PCB shipment on board the MV Wanhe is being returned to Japan
after the dock workers in Seattle refused to unload the cargo and environmentalists
threatened a lawsuit because PCB's imports into the US are not allowed.
Since Canada -the original destination of the toxic shipment- had already
denied the shipment from being offloaded, the MV Wanhe left Vancouver
9th April for Japan. The waste is being returned to Japan for one month
before it will be reshipped to a yet undisclosed location.
PCBs are listed as one of the "dirty dozen" persistent organic pollutants
(POPs) by the United Nations Environment Program for global elimination
in an international treaty presently being negotiated by over 100 governments.
Toxic Hotspots involving PCB waste from the US Millitary:
Philippines
- Clark and Subic Bases.
Northen
Mariana Islands, (Eastern Pacifc).
21
April - PVC waste pollution
in the Seto Sea
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