Bulgarian villagers protest against EU financed hazardous waste incinerator

Stara Zagora, Bulgaria -- A Bulgarian Ministry of Environment presentation about a proposed National Hazardous Waste Center in Stara Zagora provoked a demonstration last Friday at the project site by people from affected villages. Following the presentation, local protestors arrived at the planned project site with banners declaring, "No to the hazardous waste centre" and "We yearn for a sip of clean air - understand us".

The project includes a hazardous waste incinerator and is similar to a project the Ministry of Environment proposed several years ago. At the public meeting designed to allay local fears about the project's impacts, local villager Georgi Binev commented to officials, "Why are you still lying to us? You've been showing us the same presentation for the last four years. Tell us about the dioxins!"

The National Hazardous Waste Center is planned to be located near the village of Kovatchevo in Bulgaria's Stara Zagora region. It will include two hazardous waste incinerators with capacities of 15 000 and 30 000 tons of hazardous waste per year, a tank farm for liquid organic waste, a solidification facility and landfills. An additional landfill is to be built in the Sofia area. According to the project's feasibility study, half of the EUR 55.5 million investment is expected to be covered by an ISPA ¹ grant and half from a European Investment Bank loan.

Ivaylo Hlebarov, from Bulgarian NGO Za Zemiata/For the Earth, said, "We are very concerned that the Ministry of Environment does not want to find the safest solution for the hazardous waste. The Ministry's main priority is to get the ISPA grant at any cost."

One of the project's problematic issues is a conflict of interest within the Ministry of Environment. The Ministry not only has the power to give the project the go ahead based on an Environmental Impact Assessment but is also the project sponsor.

"The Ministry has completely ignored much safer non-combustion technologies for the treatment of hazardous waste, as well as possibilities to develop a decentralised hazardous waste treatment system," added Ivaylo Hlebarov. "It is alarming to see the Ministry defending the interests of private incinerator production companies while at the same time ignoring the concerns of people who have been saying no to this project for several years now."

For more information contact:

Ivaylo Hlebarov
Za Zemiata/For the Earth
Tel: +359 2851 8620
Email: hlebarov@bankwatch.org

***Photographs of the villagers' demonstration are available on request***