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Oil pollution prevention and the Ceylon
Petroleum Corporation The recent oil spill in Sri Lanka has opened the eyes of public, relevant authorities and the decision-makers about oil pollution. However, now it has been forgotten by many people with the disappearance of oil slick after using more toxic dispersants. We should understand that this would not be the last spill because there is no maintenance of the oil pipeline and no response plan for a oil spill. Shortly before the daylight on July 2, 1998 an oil layer has spread around Colombo harbour. This oil leakage was due to the breaking of a flexible rubber hose which has been connected to an oil tanker to the mooring buoy located 5 miles off the Colombo port. According to the information, the Greek ship 'Theotakas,' registered in Panama, arrived in Sri Lanka on June 31, carrying 86,000 tonnes of Iranian crude oil.' Because of the rough' sea it could not unload and it has been connected to the pipe line on July 2, at 5.00 a.m. After they began pumping they found an oil leak from the hose and stopped pumping. It had taken more than 10 minutes for this and during that period about 100 tones of oil had leaked to the sea. Though they had stopped pumping the oil that remained in the 32 kilometer long pipeline spilled into the sea. The emergency boat which was supposed to prevent the spillage had been trying to keep the ship steady during this time and they had taken more than five hours to take action. No dispersant was available with them and they had to go back to the shore for the dispersant and meanwhile the spill has spread more than 5 kilometers along the coast and more than 100 square kilometers of the sea. However, this incident shows that no proper system is available for this type of emergency situation in Sri Lanka. There is no emergency plan, no skimmers or booms or any other mechanical collection system. Also this shows the negligence of the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation and the Ports Authority. Assessing the damage As in the previous case studies on AMOCO Cadiz oil spill in southern entrance of the English channel the measure of damages at a minimum, includes: (a) the cost of the damage assessment; plus (b) the cost of restoring the natural resources to their 'pre-release' condition (or if restoration is not possible, the damages shall equal the cost of replacing the resources with equivalent resources.) Damages may also be obtained for the losses suffered from the time the resource was injured until the time it has been fully restored. The costing of this oil spill should include the permanent and temporary damage to the eco-system, fauna and flora, tourism, structures, damage due to use of dispersants, clean-up cost, cost of lost oil, lost of beaches, related administrative and legal costs etc. Unfortunately since the authorities are not interested in this case, costs were not calculated. But it is very important to cost-evaluate the damage and Ceylon Petroleum Corporation, which is mainly responsible for this due to their negligence etc., should pay this damage to restore the area for the relevant authorities. Oil spill response It was reported that they have taken more than five hours to act on this spill. Also their action was just spraying more toxic dispersant to the water without trying any other manual method. Many scientists believe that the dispersants are too toxic and they should not have used this in the first place before using any mechanical system. Oil removal (not oil dispersal) is the best response to an oil spill. Oil removal means 'Mechanical' removal and recovery of spilled oil by use of containment booms, skimmers and other mechanical equipment and devices. Any amount of spilled oil that authorities recover reduces the oil that can damage the ecosystem. On the other hand, oil dispersal, using chemical dispersants, does not remove oil from the ecosystem, but moves it into the water column from the water surface. Dispersed oil is often more toxic to marine organisms than oil that has not been dispersed. The only appropriate use of chemical dispersants is to prevent imminent migration of spilled oil to the shoreline in a situation where mechanical removal and recovery of spilled oil is not possible. A number of advanced response mechanisms are available for controlling oil spills and minimising their impacts on human health and environment. The key to effectively combating spills is careful selection and proper use of equipment and materials most suited to the type of oil and the conditions at the spill site. Most spill response equipment and materials are greatly affected by such factors as conditions at sea, water currents, and wind. Damage to spill-contaminated shorelines and dangers to other threatened areas can be reduced by timely and proper use of containment and recovery equipment. Mechanical containment Chemical and biological methods can be used in conjunction with mechanical means for containing and cleaning up oil spills. Dispersants and gelling agents are most useful in helping to keep oil from reaching shorelines and other sensitive habitats. Biological agents have the potential to assist recovery in sensitive areas such as shorelines, marshes and wetlands. Research into these technologies continues to improve oil spill clean-up. Physical methods are used to clean up shorelines. Natural processes such as evaporation, oxidation and biodegradation can start the clean-up process, but are generally too slow to provide adequate environmental recovery. Physical methods, such as wiping with sorbent materials, pressure washing, raking and bulldozing can be used to assist these natural processes. Scare tactics are used to protect birds and animals by keeping them away from oil spill areas. Such devices as propane scare-cans, floating dummies, and helium-filled balloons are often used, particularly to keep away birds. The main reason for this oil spill is lack of an emergency plan in the CPC and the Ports Authority. Many developed countries such as USA have Emergency Response Action Plan, Worst Case Discharge scenario and Dispersent Use Plan to face oil spills. The 'Emergency Response Action Plan' section is the core of the response plan. A trained spill management team must be available on a 24-hour basis to deploy and operate spill-response equipment. Unfortunately the Ceylon Petroleum Corporation and the Ports Authority seem to be not interested about these measures due to the lack of enforcement of laws in Sri Lanka. It is necessary to have such plans to avoid or face any future oil pill. Legal situation Other pollutions of CPC Also the waste oil coming from the Orugodawatta storage facility has been polluting the nearby canals. The CPC has not taken any steps to remove the waste oil in these two canals. Also for discharging of oil pollutes into the Kelani river which is used by people for their daily needs such as bathing, washing cloths etc. The Ceylon Petroleum Corporation has not taken this pollution seriously due to its inability to enforce the NEA. But there is an urgent need to combat oil pollution in Sri Lanka. From the book 'The Palm of His
Hand' by E. C. T. Candappa (Continued from yesterday) Chapter 14 About the
author Pettah at night crawled with predators. It was the city’s main business district where Colombo’s principal railway station was located. It was the hub. Further away, there was the main bus terminal. It was into this area that a million people, approximately one tenth of the country’s total population of eleven million, disgorged every morning to form part of the city’s work force. It was the largest shopping centre catering to the poor and middle classes. The Port of Colombo fronted part of its boundary and thus contained the active volcano of raging industrial disputes. It was in the heart of Pettah that the YCW had its headquarters. It figured. From here, in this run-down building, that the gangling Dutchman, Fr Grutzner, chaplain, confessor, sworn anti-Marxist, unrelenting fighter for workers’ rights and shadowy organiser of worker cells, garnered political and trade union information, often highly complex and dangerous. The YCW believed in fighting fire with fire. After leaving the National Restaurant, Raj and Bill came to this place. It was dreary after nine when all visitors had left. Dim, naked light-bulbs gave a pale effulgence and cast long, ghostly shadows. It seemed the right atmosphere for Raj’s altered mood. Bill seemed a little subdued himself. 'I wasn’t impressed with your colleague at all,' he said. 'Well, that’s the way he’s made. You know something, Bill? I think he has declared war. I believe he’ll stop at nothing to try and prevent my going with the Prime Minister. He’s a mean street fighter. But, by gum, I’m as determined to make it. Because I got it fair and square.' 'Good on you,' said Bill, and Raj, to whom the expression was new, correctly took it to be an indication of approval. 'But now we’ll put him out of our minds, relax and continue with our history lesson.' He lit another cigarette and this time he did it with every mark of luxurious leisure. He tapped one end on the box of matches, lit up, and drew deep before the unwinding process of exhaling. 'Now then,' he said, 'I have told you of the origins of the Sinhalese. And where do the Tamils come from? Eventually from where everyone else in Ceylon came or sometimes came through: India. Come over here,' he said leading Bill to a wall map of the world. 'You see here five continents and some islands. Well in the very early times, geological ages ago, many of these islands were joined to the land masses close to them. 'Likewise Ceylon was joined to India. Not only that. The land connection goes further. It was joined all the way from the tip of India to Australia. The aborigines of Australia may at one time have been on the land mass of Europe and moved downwards till they came – well Down Under. So the earliest migrations may have started well before Arthur Calwell and the end of World War I.' 'Well, I’ll be a monkey’s aunt!' said Bill fervently. Raj laughed gleefully at the reaction. 'To get back to the Tamils, there are two major theories. One is that they came from South India, and that they belonged to the Dravidian ethnic group as opposed to the Sinhalese who claim an Aryan ancestry and lineage. 'But according to Dr G C Mendis, a very respected historian whose textbooks on Ceylon and world history, some co-authored by an English writer, Dr S A Pakeman, have been used in Ceylonese schools for decades and are yet being used, some hold the belief that the Tamils of Ceylon were the descendants of the Sumerians in Babylonia. In the cradle of civilisation, in the valley between the Euphrates and the Tigris, Chaldea. These were a hard working people, past the pastoral stage and engaged in agriculture. They were also a deeply religious people. They were the first astrologers. They devised the first clock and divided the day into twenty-four hours.' Bill interrupted him. 'You’re a scholar. You know more of your history, which is a darned sight longer than ours, than I know of ours!' 'No big deal,' said Raj, 'I majored in history. As far as I am concerned, I don’t care where I came from. What matters to me is what I am now and where I go from here. I was educated in Colombo in English during the dying days of the British empire. Like it or not, I am a product of my times. I absorbed English ways with my mother’s milk, dark skinned Asians though we were. I think in English: what greater bondage can there be? When the English went to war, we followed. And suffered in the Armageddon for liberty in that war to end all wars. 'Our people died in the Middle East, in Burma, Singapore or here, in the Japanese air raids over Colombo and Trincomalee. 'But still I have what they now call the cultural cringe towards the West. 'But the fact that I am Tamil according to a legal classification does not mean that I cannot be objective. 'I agree with the theory put forward by Dr Mendis, though he remains uncommitted, that the Tamils came from Sumeria because Tamils are very hard-working, very religious, very intellectual and have a strong penchant for mathematics and figures generally. They could well be the descendants of the people who made the clock for if anyone believes that time is money the Tamils do. They hold astrology as part of their religious beliefs and not as an extra security as some others do. They combine astrology with elaborate mathematical calculations. If I may say so without denigrating my kind, Tamils are a calculating people. I do not mean that disparagingly, but it is true. They want to put a figure on any value. So there are very few artists among them. If they did paint or compose music they would first ask, 'How much?' 'Wow!' said Bill, 'that was a character sketch and a half of a people. But I am sure you exaggerate.' A wheezy clock struck ten. The last of the sounds of people bedding down for the night ceased. Pettah wound down early and woke by five. Traffic sounds also dwindled to the occasional car horn and the drowsy drone of the sea nearby. Raj had cast a spell on Bill. He was eager to learn more. 'So how did the conflict between the Sinhalese and the Tamils start?' 'There again the beginnings go back to ancient times. I mean, there’s a short answer that might suit some people...but for you Bill, because you have come here in a spirit of service and not to spy or cause trouble of any sort...' Bill stood up, placed his hand on his chest: 'White man come in peace,' he grinned. '...and because I know something of how the YCW operates, the entire background to the present situation must be given if it is to make sense. You put the pieces together any way you want. I’ll place them all before you.' 'With a professorial skill,' Bill grinned. 'Let’s say with a journalist’s thoroughness,' Raj countered. 'I will not, however, crowd your mind with the details of kings and wars and the rise and fall of dynasties. But the historical reasons for the conflict between the Sinhalese and the Tamils go back to conflicts with the Indians.' Raj continued: 'There were two types of incursions by the Indians. The first came from the north, and that was the one that changed the face of Ceylon and stamped its distinctive character. That was the introduction of Buddhism by the great Indian emperor towards the end of the third century BC. This intervention in Ceylonese history was one of great compassion, one of great selflessness. 'It brought a great civilising influence into the country and to this day bestows a serenity and peace to the nation by and large. The arrival of Buddhism and the manner of its arrival provide a sharp and dramatic contrast to the arrival of Christianity, with the arrival of the Portuguese conquistadors, with, as they recall, the sword in one hand and the Bible in the other. 'The evangelising zeal of the Catholic Portuguese was a secondary string to the main purpose of Portuguese expansion of trade in spices in the Far East. The appalling cruelty associated both with the promotion of trade and religion by the Portuguese is part of the island’s tragic hereditary memory. However, the other incursion by the Indians came from the south and these were purely military and inspired by territorial aggrandisement, greed and wickedness. 'Ceylon is so close to India that it is a constant temptation to rulers across the eighteen miles of sea that separate the two countries to cross over and grab some territory and other spoils. 'And so while the Sinhalese were well established in their kingdoms in the northern, central and southern parts of the island, there were powerful kingdoms in the south of India - the Pandyans, Cholas and the Keralas. Time and time again some ambitious ruler would invade Ceylon, defeat a Sinhalese king and rule over the Sinhalese. They would be repulsed repeatedly and this pattern disturbed the prosperous ways of the Sinhalese. 'By now they were an extremely cultured people. They had their well-developed language, they excelled in the art of agriculture and had an excellent system of government. They also wrought their way out of the Stone Age into the Iron Age and with advanced implements constructed enormous irrigation tanks, elaborate canals and beautiful temples. 'But wars always set them back. 'The turning point came when a South Indian king named Elara invaded Ceylon, fought against a Sinhalese king named Asela ruling in Anuradhapura, defeated him and became ruler of the kingdom in the north. In another kingdom of the south called Ruhuna, there was a prince who, from his tender years, found the presence of the foreign ruler a source of unbearable irritation. When he was sixteen he gathered a small army and began a protracted war against the Indian invader. 'In order to settle the issue once and for all, and to keep the armies out of it, they settled on a most civilised means of ending the conflict. (How desirable it would be to settle modern conflicts in this way! It would signal the end to all wars.) 'The two kings decided to have it out only between themselves on the backs of elephants, a sort of tournament. 'Well, the Sinhalese King Dutugemunu won, but he was magnanimous in victory. He had Elara cremated right where he fell, with all possible honours - for he had been a fair and valiant foe - and built a monument there enshrining the dead king’s trappings. 'He went further. He ordered all who happened to pass by to pay homage to the Tamil ruler, whom he had detested and whom he had fought and defeated. This was observed even after the victor himself had passed on. 'Such was the chivalry of the man and of the times. It does my heart good to hear of rulers behaving in a noble manner.' 'You are a royalist at heart, aren’t you?' asked Bill. 'Your perception even at this late hour amazes me,' said Raj, and continued: 'That was supposed to end the Tamil-Sinhalese conflict, but alas, there were other South Indian rulers who kept coming on and eventually, the exhausted Sinhalese kings abandoned their kingdoms to the Tamils and drifted southwards. 'With the passage of centuries, the great civilisations of the Sinhalese fell into decay, the jungle took over, and created a barrier between the Tamils, now established in the north, and the Sinhalese in the central, western and southern parts of the island. 'The Tamils in the meanwhile had established a kingdom of their own around the 13th century in the north where once the Sinhalese held sway. It was known as Yapane in Sinhala and Yalpanam in Tamil.' 'I’ve heard a different version,' said Bill. 'I know,' said Raj. 'However, it is not a question of which came first. A Jesuit priest and an eminent historian states quite categorically that there is evidence of a definite and prolonged Sinhalese presence in the Jaffna peninsula well before the South Indian invaders arrived. There are remains of Buddhist places of worship that predate the Tamil presence. (Continued tomorrow) |
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