POLLUTER PAYS PRINCIPLE

A few weeks back Canada 's Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from Imperial Oil (Edmonton , AB), seeking to overturn a ruling that required it to pay for cleanup of a fuel depot the company had operated at Levis , PQ .

The company's attorneys argued that the cleanup order issued by Quebec Government was a conflict of interest because it would save the provincial government from having to pay money in another lawsuit. Residents living near the contaminated site were in the process of suing the government to recoup money lost through diminished property value.

The Supreme Court rejected the argument. "The Government has the responsibility of protecting the public interest in the environment and make its decisions in consideration of that interest," the court ruled.

The Canadian Chemical Producers' Association (CCPA) says that their preliminary review of the ruling indicates that it will not have broad influence on the country's site remediation lawsuits. The ruling addresses a specific charge of conflict or interest and therefore applies to a more narrow set of circumstances.

Canada does not have a programme similar to Superfund in the US .

Will the above judgment be a trend setter?

The above judgment of Canadian Supreme Court may become a trend setter and should be taken note of by the judiciary as well as chemical industries .

The most serious problem confronted by the chemical industries is, ofcourse the need to produce of products without harming the environment. While various steps have been initiated by chemical industries all over the world in ensuring environmental cleanliness while producing goods,ultimately the permission to operate chemical industries can only be a compromise decision.

In future, as environmental requirements would become a more crucial subject, chemical industries are likely to face more difficult conditions.

However until recently, chemical industries have only been ordered to close down the operation due to environmental violation but have not been asked to compensate the public and society for whatever harm that its operation could have caused to the environmental scenario.

The judgement of Canadian Supreme Court brings out a new dimension, where the polluters have been asked to pay and compensate for harm that have been created.

In many cases, this could well be beyond capacity of the chemical industries to pay. Such conditions may possibly deter more and more players from venturing into chemical industries in future.

BILLION DOLLAR BUSINESS

Every two years, Indonesia loses about four million hectares of forest, an area roughly the size of Switzerland, to rapacious logging. Skies in Northern China glow orange due to sand storms that cross the Pacific and lay dust on the Western US. In Hong Kong, raw sewage bobs in its pearl blue harbour.

According to one senior United Nations environmental official, from inner Mongolia to the Indian subcontinent and tropical Southeast Asia, the region's ecology and environment is deteriorating even as its factories and economies boom.

Governments are rolling out unprecedented initiatives to tackle Asian pollution. There are policy initiatives that have been taken and laws enacted and so on, but the problem is the actual implementation.

Six of the world's 15 most polluted cities are in Asia and the region generates a third of the world's carbon dioxide emissions. In Asia 's developing regions, around 785 million people lack regular access to safe water, UN statistics show.

But there are pockets of improvement. The air quality which has been notoriously polluted Bangkok , Dhaka , New Delhi and several Chinese cities is healthier now, after most of Asia, except for Indonesia, phased out lead from gasoline.

Bangladesh, which is spending $30 million over two years to bring natural gas to 100 petrol stations, is replacing high polluting two stroke engines in its rickshaw taxis in the capital Dhaka with cleaner burning natural gas power.

Thailand 's "tuk tuk" taxis now run on liquefied petroleum gas, while buses and taxis in New Delhi and Mumbai are phasing out diesel and running instead on compressed natural gas. This could be very much the story of the future.

Fixing Asia 's environmental mess - from stifling sandstroms and rapid soil erosion in China to treating sewage in Indian rivers and Southeast Asian air pollution - is turning into a billion dollar business.

US Department of Commerce is sending an "Environmental Technologies Trade Mission" to Malaysia , Thailand and Vietnam next March to scout for opportunities for US companies, citing "significant" potential for US business.

It estimates that Malaysia 's "environmental market" is worth around $800 million, mostly for safe water supply and sewage treatment and says that Thailand needs to spend around $1.2 to $1.5 billion on clean water and sanitation by 2020.

INDUSTRY STATUS

Important Derivatives of Carbon disulphide

Mancozeb, Maneb, Thiram (Tetra Methyl Thiram disulphide) (TMTD), Ziram (Zinc Dimethyl Dithio Carbomate) (ZDDC), Mercapto, Benzimedazole (MBI), Xanthate Chemicals

PRODUCT APPLICATIONS

Indian Manufacturers of Carbondisulphide

Two important units namely SIV Industries, TamilNadu and Gwalior Rayons, Kerala have recently stopped production.

Indian Demand

Indian Demand for Carbon disulphide Around 95000 tonnes per annum

Of this, around 80000 tonnes per annum of Carbon disulphide is consumed by Viscose Rayon Industry and the requirement for Viscose Rayon Industry is largely met by captive production by the Viscose Rayon units.

Broad outline of Manufacturing Process 

AMMONIUM BICARBONATE – INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY

This article discusses the following aspects :

FREE FLOW REFINED, EDIBLE IODISED SALT – INVESTMENT OPPORTUNITY

In this article, following aspects are discussed in detailed manner :

Two top US climate scientists said that there is no longer any doubt that human activities are changing the Earth's atmosphere and its climate and that children and grandchildren will inherit the consequences.

In a paper published in the latest issue of the journal Science, Thomas R.Karl and Kevin E. Trenberth say that researchers remain uncertain about the precise course of climate change from here. That change has already "exceeded the bounds of natural variability. We are entering the unknown."

Karl is director of the National Climate Data Centre in Asheville . N C Trenberth heads or climate analysis section of the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder , Colo.

The paper's conclusions are likely to encourage environmentalists and others arguing for legislation leading to mandatory caps or reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

Life on Earth is dependent on the atmosphere's greenhouse effect, which traps solar heat and keeps the planet habitable. The mechanism is regulated mostly by the chemical composition of the atmosphere as well as by cloud, snow and ice cover, volcanic eruptions and other factors.

Over the past 50 years, the authors say, emissions of greenhouse gases -- chiefly carbon dioxide released by the combustion of fossil fuels -- have altered atmospheric chemistry . And because these gases remain in the atmosphere for decades or centuries the effects have been cumulative and will be long lasting. "The rate of change can be slowed, but it is unlikely to be stopped in the 21st century."

The emission of greenhouse gases in the United States has increased between 0.5 percent and 1 percent per year in recent decades, studies have found.

Already it is estimated that the Earth's climate has exceeded the bounds of natural variability and this has been the case since about 1980.

In the absence of efforts to slow the accumulation of carbon dioxide and other green house gases in the atmosphere, scientists have predicted that average global temperatures are likely to rise roughly by 3 to 7 degress Fahrenheit by the end of the century. The projected change is far faster than any natural process and "certainly those prevailing over the past 10,000 years," the study says.

"A combination of ocean temperature increases and ice sheet melting could systematically inundate the world's coasts by raising sea level for centuries," the scientists say.

Understanding of the Earth's climate system is also complicated by uncertainties about "feedback" mechanisms. The biggest unknown is how clouds fit into the picture. Rising temperatures and increased evaporation are likely to create great cloud cover. More clouds can then reflect more solar energy back into space, cooling the surface. But by how much?

Efforts to construct computer models of the planet's complex climate system, the authors say, have been frustrated by limited knowledge, inadequate or incomplete measurements of past and present conditions and by limited computer power.

"Progress here is dependent not only on overcoming scientific and technical issues," they say, "but also major institutional and international obstacles related to the free flow of climate related data and information."