A blogger in another section of the local media could not but help reacting by quoting some of the Beatles’ lyrics of their song Nowhere Man when he read about Gonzi’s promised Mepa reply to the black dust problem:
“He’s as blind as he can be,
Just sees what he wants to see…”
I have decided to postpone my budget comments until next week since I had to file this article ahead of the budget presentation session held yesterday.
The way things have evolved on the black dust issue says more about how the environment is treated by the local authorities rather than on the black dust issue per se. A case which definitely cannot be treated in isolation.
Some of the local media tried to muzzle the fact that the only thing that had prodded the prime minister to commit himself somehow to addressing the black dust problem was the fact that he had just been dealt a heavy blow in Parliament as former Minister Mugliett stood up in the House to complain on the political impotence both government and Mepa were showing in addressing this issue which is affecting Southern citizens, although not exclusively.
As I recently argued on TV during the Super 1 programme TX we are now in a worse situation than we were in 10 years ago.
Ten years ago we had a minister who took the decision to bring in paid foreign consultants to probe the matter and who later went on to declare that he had an action plan developed to follow up their investigations. A few months or years passed and the then Minister for Enemalta Prof. Josef Bonnici claimed that the plan was already underway and that as a result of remedial action taken we were already enjoying the benefits of cleaner air.
This time round we are in a bigger fix because although 10 years ago the government had claimed to be implementing a solution of sorts, as confirmed by the PM in Parliament we are still far from implementing a solution, since the only thing he could commit himself to was a promise that he would ask Mepa officials to start collating all material into what was causing the black dust problem over the south of the island.
The PM must have squirmed in his seat when a former minister of his told him in no uncertain words that he would continue to insist that the people of the south deserved better and could no longer wait years for answers. Mr Mugliett was also heard complaining formally in the House that the people were living this problem every day and should not be treated like a ping pong ball going from one agency to another.
On a different level Nationalist MP Dr Jean Pierre Farrugia had shown the same sense of exasperation when he put pen to paper in a newspaper to complain on the need for more pro-activity by the government and Mepa in addressing the noxious smells at Marsa waterfront.
What is ironic on this issue is that although when I raised the Hexagon House noxious smells issue in the House, Dr Chris Said the Parliamentary Secretary at OPM told me that my questions were too technical and that he would promise me a Prime Ministerial reply if I had to resubmit them in writing rather than orally, when I did so last Wednesday the PM who was in the House merely told me that he will reply during yet another sitting!
Although going back to the black dust issue Dr Gonzi promised that all available material re Mepa investigations would be laid on the Table of the House since there was nothing secret or sinister that the government should be ashamed of and that experts had analysed the black dust issue since August without arriving at a conclusion as to where this was emanating from there remain certain burning issues that need addressing. Apart from the fact that Lawrence Gonzi must commit himself at some stage to a time frame within which such studies will be presented to the House of Representatives for public and parliamentary scrutiny.
Some of the data technical collaborators of mine have been collecting from MEPA air monitoring stations are sufficiently worrying.
As is common knowledge Mepa has four air monitoring stations located at Zejtun, at Corradino, at Msida in front of the Parish Church and another one at Gharb, Gozo.
While the stations at Msida and Zejtun give hourly data which is stored and is easily accessible to the public from the Mepa website even in backdated form, the ones at Corradino and Gharb only give instant data which cannot be retrieved in backdated form.
This apart the stations at Zejtun and Msida measure a wider array of pollutants than the other two.
For the scope of the analysis carried out, the level of Sulphur Dioxide has been monitored on an hourly basis between 1 and 31 October.
SO2 as is commonly known is one of the major pollutants emitted by power stations and when it is mixed with water it forms an acid which damages our stone. The unit used in the data is micro grammes per cubic metre.
Concurrently with SO2 the amount of dust in two different sizes collected has also been monitored on an hourly basis for the same period. The amounts collected are not necessarily all made up of black dust, but one can easily assume that if all dust particles present in the air are being monitored, black dust particles would definitely be included within the quantities collected.
Thus if there is an increase in the amount of black dust this would or should be reflected in the total amount of dust particles collected within that hour.
Regarding wind direction, if a north west wind is blowing, a wind blowing between 300 deg and 330 deg would blow dust emitted by the Marsa Power Station in the direction of Zejtun while on the other hand a wind blowing between 150 deg and 180 deg would blow any pollutants by the Marsa Power Station towards Msida.
For some reason the Zejtun monitoring station seemed to have been switched off between 7 October at 2pm and 16 October 2pm. As a consequence of this there are nine days of missing data.
When examining trends re SO2 and dust particles one can easily tell that there is an evident pattern in that there are several instances when the amount of dust collected is at a peak, and where the amount of SO2 although to a lesser extent, is also at a peak. This applies to charts relating to both Zejtun and Msida station.
Good examples of such peaks are those detected on the first chart on 3 October at 10pm, 4 October at 6pm, and 19 October at 9am etc. At Msida, this is more evident on 1 October at 8pm, as well as on 20 October at 3pm.
This implies that there seems to be a strong link between the amount of dust collected and the amount of SO2 in the air, since both pollutants tend to have similar peaks.
Even regarding wind directions, both wind direction regarding Msida and Zejtun, tend to correspond to the bearing of the Marsa Power Station in relation to the air monitoring stations.
Admittedly this analysis is based purely on observations and logical analysis of the data collected, but there are strong indications that even without carrying out any chemical analysis on the black dust being collected, there are strong links between the amounts of dust collected by the Mepa air monitoring stations, and the levels of SO2 in the air and wind directions which all point at the Marsa Power Station being arguably the major source of dust particles.
In the absence of a track record of how precipitators have been performing at Marsa since their inception it is very hard to accept the Enemalta claim that 80 per cent of emissions pollutants at Marsa Power Station have been controlled.
To be fair the only entity ruling out Enemalta involvement is Enemalta itself since neither Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco nor Mepa’s Environmental Chief – who was apparently under reported by design in the media – could rule out an accusing finger being ultimately pointed in the direction of Enemalta.
It is a given that at one point in time one particular precipitator was inactive for the best part of a year after having been struck by lightning.
What also merits deeper probing is why certain tests have been carried out locally while others have been carried out abroad. This apart we have been told that so called SEM/EDX texts have been carried out at Heritage Malta’s Bighi labs, while none of the authorities has so far bothered to explain our genuine query as to why so called ICPMS tests have not been carried out abroad when they are know to virtually separate automatically any contamination while giving quicker results and data that can be obtained for almost the entire periodic table in just minutes.
Let us hope that when the data is finally submitted by the prime minister in Parliament without any further undue delay there will be no cover ups or attempts to massage the figures, particularly since we have just been informed in the House by Minister Gatt that although government still seems to be determined (sic) to close the Marsa plant by 2012 it will all depend on whether we will have linked up with the Sicilian interconnector or not!
As for the Budget 2010 – see you next week!
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www.leobrincat.com
Leo Brincat is the main Opposition spokesperson for the Environment, Sustainable Development and Climate Change.