Skating away

Braving stiff opposition, the Himachal Pradesh government gave a go-ahead to the Himalayan Ski Village (hsv) project in Manali (see 'Holy Hex', Down To Earth, May 15, 2006). The state government signed the implementation programme on June 5, on the basis of the company's preliminary project report. The company is now carrying out a detailed environmental impact assessment programme that will take one year for completion.

Shelling out bucks

A Nigerian court has ordered Royal Dutch Shell to pay us $1.5 billion as damages for causing pollution in the state of Bayelsa located in the Niger Delta. The court upheld a resolution by the Nigerian National Assembly, which said that Shell should pay the money to the ethnic Ijaw communities in the state.

Avian disaster

A recent major oil spill off Estonia's northwestern coast has damaged the marine ecosystem in the Baltic Sea and its delicate bird population, authorities said. The spill was located in the coastal areas of Laane and Harju counties, some 100 km southwest of the capital, Tallinn. It was caused by an unidentified ship, which might have deliberately leaked the oil, according to Estonia's environment ministry.

Timely action

Remedial action taken quickly prevented a major oil spill in Mangere, New Zealand, from causing serious environmental damage. Around 2,000 litres of oil was recently spilled from a fuel storage site of Transport Dynamics into a tributary of Waokauri Creek, which flows into the Manukau harbour. The Auckland Regional Council's 24-hour pollution hotline was called and together with the company and Spill Response, they were successful in containing the spill. Oil was removed from the stream using absorbent materials and vacuum loading trucks.

Paying the price

Australia's highest environment penalty of more than us $1 million was recently imposed on a German shipping company for an oil spill in Phillip Island. The court found the ship was knowingly sailing with leaking oil tanks and structural problems, when it left Melbourne for Sydney on February 27, 2003.

Paradise threatened

Recently tonnes of oil slick and oil tar were washed off into the Arabian Sea, polluting half a dozen beaches in Goa. This is the second such incident to have occurred this year in India's top tourist destination. L U Joshi, chairperson, Goa Pollution Control Board blamed big ships, empty tankers and ocean liners which wash themselves in the Arabian Sea after delivery, a practice that is otherwise banned.

Karachi fish kill

a huge quantity of dead fish recently washed ashore at Karachi coast in Pakistan, with scientists attributing the mass death to pollution by the July 2003 oil spill from tanker Tasman Spirit, off the Karachi coast. They also blame dumping of by-catch by foreign trawlers into the sea for the mishap. Concerns have been heightened by the possibility of the dead fish, containing harmful pollutants, having been fed to poultry.

Crude shock

Oil storage tanks ruptured by hurricane Katrina are estimated to have dumped around 14 millions litres (ml) of crude oil into the Lower Mississippi river and surrounding wetlands in Louisiana, usa, threatening the region's environment. Some of this oil would also find its way into the Gulf of Mexico.

Bytes

are readily able to degrade crude oil. Scientists from the Estacin Experimental del Zaidn in Granada investigated in situ crude oil degradation after the Prestige oil tanker accident off the Spanish coast in November 2002. The study also concluded that, probably due to frequent contamination of that coast, indigenous microbial population had evolved to select organisms that are able to grow and degrade crude oil.

In Short

water distress: The Andhra Pradesh government has embarked upon a new programme to meet the water requirements of its parched villages. It is forcibly taking over private agricultural borewells to supply drinking water. Media reports quoted officials as saying that 528 borewells have already been taken over. The government is offering the farmers a payment equivalent to one season's yield for the water drawn from their wells. Of the 1,67,000 borewells in the state that provide drinking water, 14,000 have dried up.