Clemente Bautista, Jr. Kalikasan-PNE National Coordinator
September 14, 2007
Green activist group Kalikasan People's Network for the Environment (Kalikasan PNE) today called on Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) Secretary Sec. Lito Atienza to junk a controversial and dysfunctional air pollution monitoring project supported by his predecessor, Sec. Angelo Reyes.
In a statement, Kalikasan PNE National Coordinator Clemente Bautista Jr. said that the $1.3 million Ambient Air Pollution Monitoring Project between the DENR and Emissions Technology Inc. (ETI), a Guam-based company, failed to produce credible data on Metro Manila's state of air pollution and should be terminated.
Kalikasan PNE, an umbrella network of environmental groups, and militant fisherfolk organization Pamalakaya brought the controversial project to the attention of Bayan Muna Rep. Teodoro Casino. Grilled by the solon during the House budget deliberations this week, Atienza said that he would be reviewing the project.
"We beg to rebut Sec. Atienza's assertion that the latest Letter of Undertaking (LoU) submitted by ETI President Robert Wilson to Sec. Reyes dated July 16, 2007 only means that the DENR basically showed the "intention to proceed with the contract. On the contrary, the LoU expressly states that the DENR-EMB shall pay ETI the full amount of US$1,314,776.49 within five days after ETI posts a performance bond of only US$44,000," Bautista said.
"Had this project not been exposed to the public earlier, the DENR might have paid ETI the full payment for their dysfunctional air pollution monitoring stations around Metro Manila," Bautista said.
"The Ambient Air Pollution Monitoring Project clearly failed to produce credible data that can be of substantial use to reducing air pollution in Metro Manila. ETI should also be made accountable for its litany of technical and legal shortcomings and failures during the project's implementation. We strongly urge Sec. Atienza to junk the project with finality and scrap any proposal to pay ETI its back dues," Bautista said.
"The levels of air pollution in Manila are hitting record-highs and are yielding silent but deadly effects on the people's health and the environment. What's atrociously unfortunate about the Ambient Air Monitoring Project is that the defective data it produced will not help in creating policies that can mitigate or reduce current levels of pollution in Metro Manila," Bautista said.
"At least five thousand Metro Manilans are dying each year from the effects of such unmitigated air pollution. Thousands more are getting sick with respiratory diseases exacerbated by exposure to various pollutants in the air," Bautista said.
Recent findings by the Philippine Environment Monitor, a joint report of the World Bank and the DENR, showed that an estimated 4,968 premature deaths occur annually in Manila (accounting for around 12 percent of all deaths in the metropolis) due to respiratory and cardiovascular diseases from exposure to poor air quality, Bautista noted.
The Ambient Air Network Project is a US$6 million project between the DENR and a joint venture between ETI and Industramach Inc. (IMACH) since 2002, which set up ten (10) air monitoring stations throughout Metro Manila meant to measure ambient air (or air outside and surrounding an air pollution source location) and pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, ozone, particulate matter and total suspended solids.
The project drew controversy and opposition under Sec. Angelo Reyes' term at the DENR, when IMACH officially withdrew as a partner to the ETI on February 14 2005 after the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) and the DENR's own legal departments recommended that payments to the ETI-IMACH be terminated and their contract be terminated due to the latter's failure to address technical and legal issues.
September 14, 2007
Green activist group Kalikasan People's Network for the Environment (Kalikasan PNE) today called on Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) Secretary Sec. Lito Atienza to junk a controversial and dysfunctional air pollution monitoring project supported by his predecessor, Sec. Angelo Reyes.
In a statement, Kalikasan PNE National Coordinator Clemente Bautista Jr. said that the $1.3 million Ambient Air Pollution Monitoring Project between the DENR and Emissions Technology Inc. (ETI), a Guam-based company, failed to produce credible data on Metro Manila's state of air pollution and should be terminated.
Kalikasan PNE, an umbrella network of environmental groups, and militant fisherfolk organization Pamalakaya brought the controversial project to the attention of Bayan Muna Rep. Teodoro Casino. Grilled by the solon during the House budget deliberations this week, Atienza said that he would be reviewing the project.
"We beg to rebut Sec. Atienza's assertion that the latest Letter of Undertaking (LoU) submitted by ETI President Robert Wilson to Sec. Reyes dated July 16, 2007 only means that the DENR basically showed the "intention to proceed with the contract. On the contrary, the LoU expressly states that the DENR-EMB shall pay ETI the full amount of US$1,314,776.49 within five days after ETI posts a performance bond of only US$44,000," Bautista said.
"Had this project not been exposed to the public earlier, the DENR might have paid ETI the full payment for their dysfunctional air pollution monitoring stations around Metro Manila," Bautista said.
"The Ambient Air Pollution Monitoring Project clearly failed to produce credible data that can be of substantial use to reducing air pollution in Metro Manila. ETI should also be made accountable for its litany of technical and legal shortcomings and failures during the project's implementation. We strongly urge Sec. Atienza to junk the project with finality and scrap any proposal to pay ETI its back dues," Bautista said.
"The levels of air pollution in Manila are hitting record-highs and are yielding silent but deadly effects on the people's health and the environment. What's atrociously unfortunate about the Ambient Air Monitoring Project is that the defective data it produced will not help in creating policies that can mitigate or reduce current levels of pollution in Metro Manila," Bautista said.
"At least five thousand Metro Manilans are dying each year from the effects of such unmitigated air pollution. Thousands more are getting sick with respiratory diseases exacerbated by exposure to various pollutants in the air," Bautista said.
Recent findings by the Philippine Environment Monitor, a joint report of the World Bank and the DENR, showed that an estimated 4,968 premature deaths occur annually in Manila (accounting for around 12 percent of all deaths in the metropolis) due to respiratory and cardiovascular diseases from exposure to poor air quality, Bautista noted.
The Ambient Air Network Project is a US$6 million project between the DENR and a joint venture between ETI and Industramach Inc. (IMACH) since 2002, which set up ten (10) air monitoring stations throughout Metro Manila meant to measure ambient air (or air outside and surrounding an air pollution source location) and pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, ozone, particulate matter and total suspended solids.
The project drew controversy and opposition under Sec. Angelo Reyes' term at the DENR, when IMACH officially withdrew as a partner to the ETI on February 14 2005 after the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB) and the DENR's own legal departments recommended that payments to the ETI-IMACH be terminated and their contract be terminated due to the latter's failure to address technical and legal issues.
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