March 19, 1999. Copyright 1999. Graphic News. All rights reserved.

ICI TOPS POLLUTION BLACKLIST
By Oliver Burkeman

GRAPHIC NEWS, London, March 22 Ð THE chemicals giant ICI emerges today as BritainÕs worst polluter by a long chalk in 1997-98, leading the field for pollution offences in the Environment AgencyÕs first-ever Ônaming and shamingÕ exercise.
The league table, which ranks companies by court-imposed fines for environmental damage, shows that the company paid £382,500 over the period as a result of three prosecutions Ð far ahead of the runner-up, Midlands-based Tyseley Waste Disposal, which paid out £95,000. London Waste and Wessex Water take third and fourth places with fines of £38,500 and £36,500 respectively.

ICIÕs humiliating lead is mostly due to a £300,000 fine imposed in March 1998 for one of BritainÕs worst ever groundwater pollution incidents at Runcorn in Cheshire. Almost 150 tonnes of chloroform leaked from a broken pipe into local groundwater Ð an amount so vast that it would require the water of half a million Olympic-sized swimming pools to dilute it to acceptable drinking-water levels. The leak remained unnoticed for four and a half hours and was only reported when the smell of chloroform led a contractor working on the site to a gushing 3ft fountain of the toxic substance.

Four months later ICI were fined a further £80,000 for leaking 56 tonnes of the hazardous industrial solvent trichloroethylene from the same site. And earlier this year Ð in an incident not covered by todayÕs Hall of Shame Ð hydrochloric acid seeped from the Teeside plant of ICI-owned Tioxide Europe into Greenabella Marsh, an important habitat for birds and an officially designated site of special scientific interest.

ÒBusinesses must understand they have a responsibility to protect the environment and need to be held to account.Ó said Environment Agency Director of Operations, Archie Robertson. ÒThe companies included in our Hall of Shame have let down the public, the environment and their own industry,Ó, he added.

Even the quantity of materials ICI releases legally is staggering: 3.4 million tonnes of waste was produced in 1998, including 43,000 tonnes of hazardous substances disposed of on land and 2,800 tonnes of particulates released into the air. 
Nevertheless, the firm insists that it is cleaning up its act. In a report published this month the company claims to be reducing its Ôenvironmental burdenÕ in line with Ôtough voluntary safety, health and environmental targetsÕ, reducing potentially hazardous emissions to air by 54 per cent and aquatic ecotoxicity by 59 per cent compared with 1995. 

ÒOur commitment to achieving high standards in safety, health and environment is demonstrated by the considerable progress we have made,Ó said ICI Chief Executive Charles Miller Smith.
Despite the heavy punishments imposed on ICI, the Environment Agency remains concerned that its zealous prosecutions Ð 600 in 1997-8, an increase on the previous year of 16 per cent Ð are not being matched by the fines imposed by the courts.

ÒTough action by the Environment Agency in the field needs to be matched by tougher penalties in the courts, said chief executive Ed Gallagher.

ÒThe average fine for a prosecution last year was £2,786. Clearly this is not sending out a strong enough message to deter large businesses that have the potential to seriously damage the environment,Ó he continued.

The record-breaking fine imposed on ICI has been decisively broken since the period covered by the blacklist. In January, Milford Haven Port Authority was fined £4 million in a prosecution brought by the Agency for the 1996 ÔSea EmpressÕ oil disaster. Environmental groups condemned the fine as risible in comparison with the ecological and financial costs of the spillage of over 72,000 tonnes of oil along the British coastline.
/Ends

Source: The Environment Agency