With the progress of the lawsuit against Hydro, by the Rotterdam District Court in the Netherlands, the merit analysis phase will be reached. That is, after the jurisdiction analysis stage, with the decision that the international court has jurisdiction to analyze the case, the court will evaluate the different versions about the episode that occurred in 2018, in Barcarena, a municipality in northeastern Pará. Hydro is accused of flooding areas near the company with contaminated material, affecting rivers, streams and the surrounding community.

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The company denies the accusations. In a note sent to the newspaper O Liberal, after the publication of the report on the Dutch court's decision to try the case, Hydro states that "Alunorte reiterates that there was no overflow during the heavy rains that hit Barcarena and surrounding areas in February 2018. More than 90 inspections/audits conducted by public agencies have confirmed this," says the text.

The company confirms in the note that it will respond to the Dutch court case. "Finally, with regard to the Rotterdam Court decision, Hydro vehemently denies the allegations presented by the plaintiffs and will present its defense in accordance with the process established by the Court".  

However, official reports and measures taken also by public agencies go in the opposite direction of the company's statement, proving that the accusations against the mining company are strong. According to the Evandro Chagas Institute (IEC), which at the time was triggered by the State Public Prosecutor's Office (MPPA) and the Federal Public Prosecutor's Office (MPF) to assess the socio-environmental impacts and health risks to the residents of Barcarena, the overflow of the chemical tailings ponds was proven, according to Marcelo Lima, a researcher in Public Health at the IEC, who coordinated the research team:

"The studies showed that there was, yes, overflowing, in addition to regular releases of untreated effluents containing high levels of toxic metals, such as lead and mercury. In addition, at the time, there were two types of overflow: one into the plant itself and the other out. The waste that remained inside was also directly into the Murucupi River. We found, later, also in the Pará River”.

The researcher emphasizes that the reports were based on on-site visits, in addition to photos that recorded the overflow of the basins and chemical analysis of the tailings and environmental samples.

Contamination of communities with lead and nickel, says researcher

The IEC studies reinforce a diagnosis of contamination that the population of Barcarena had been suffering for a longer time, as found that same year, the result of a research conducted by the Laboratory of Analytical and Environmental Chemistry (Laquanam), Federal University of Pará (UFPA), at the request of the MPF, whose analysis began in 2015.

According to Simone Pereira, PhD in analytical chemistry, coordinator of Laquanam, 90 residents of the area around the mining company had their hair samples chemically analyzed, from which the presence of toxic and carcinogenic chemical elements at levels above the health standard was verified: "We analyzed 21 chemical elements and compared the quantities found in the residents of Barcarena with the sample of people not exposed to contamination, residents of Altamira, and found the disparity between the values. Aluminum, for example, was absurdly above the average, even when compared to the world average.

Residents of Barcarena had 27 times more aluminum in their bodies than the residents of Altamira. The leader that was found is the most worrisome, because it is at high levels in 24 of the 26 communities. It was also found in the water that these people ingest. Another worrisome substance is chromium because it was noticed in the blood. Nickel was also found in proportion three times higher than the normal range", describes the researcher.

Elements such as leader and nickel can cause a range of abnormalities in the human body. Lead severely affects brain function, blood, kidneys, digestive and reproductive systems, including the possibility of producing genetic mutations in offspring. 

Nickel, in turn, causes hypersensitivity in the oral cavity, alteration and death of cells, and contact dermatitis, besides having significant potential to induce genetic mutations and cause cancer.

What researcher Simone Pereira emphasizes, therefore, is that even before the overflow of the basins, the population of Barcarena already presented, as verified by the studies, high levels of contamination. For her, the calamity in 2018 was just an aggravating event of the situation: "The 2018 overflow drew a lot of attention, but our studies, started in 2015, whose results were ready just at the time of the leak, show that the problem had been there for a long time. And what's worse: it continues to this day. These elements continue contaminating the rivers and people are left without treatment," he says.

Water from the industrial process was not properly treated

Hydro's note also states that "with regard to the Alunorte plant, it is important to clarify that no water that comes into contact with the industrial process of Alunorte is returned to the environment without prior and proper treatment. The Alunorte plant has one of the largest Industrial Effluent Treatment Plants (ETEI) in Latin America. Alunorte makes constant investments to reinforce the robustness of its operation, contributing to make the refinery even safer, considering the possibility of severe climate changes in the future".

However, according to IEC researcher Marcelo Lima, the practice may only have occurred after the 2018 episode, when the company "was pressured" to promote investments in this area, because until 2018, when the institute made inspections in the company's industrial hub, it was found that Hydro did not have the necessary structure to promote adequate treatment for the volume of tailings produced before being dumped into the river.

"We found, at the time, that there was an undersizing in their under-dimensioning of their effluent treatment capacity. If they are able to treat it today, I can't say. No new studies were made. But at that time, they couldn't treat all their effluents, especially when the volume of the effluents was very high, such as during the rainy season," says the researcher.

In addition, Marcelo recalls that it was found, after visiting the site, that there was, yes, dumping of tailings from the company directly into the river through clandestine pipeline: "It was not even just a clandestine pipeline, but a whole channel of tailings in the Pará and Murucupi Rivers. In recent years, by that time, the company had already increased its production more than five times, but not the capacity to treat the effluents. So these channels were being used to discharge all this waste directly into the environment", he says.

 TAC is being "rolled up", says the community and the Barcarena MP

Hydro's note addresses a Conduct Adjustment Agreement (TAC) signed in a "voluntary" manner, according to the company, with the Public Ministry and other authorities, as recently as September 2018. According to Hydro, the document was made "in order to conduct comprehensive studies conducted by specialized experts. The ongoing work is being monitored by Barcarena's communities, which include members of the Barcarena City Council, representatives of the Chemical Industry Workers Union of the Municipality of Barcarena (Sindquímicos) and representatives of civil society distributed in ten representations. The site www.tachydro.com.br provides information about activities related to the TAC and allows its monitoring by the whole society".

For Maria do Socorro Costa e Silva, president of the Association of Caboclos, Indigenous and Quilombolas of the Amazon (Cainquiama), and resident of the Burajuba quilombola community, this monitoring by the residents does not exist, because there is no transparency in the process. She also does not recognize the names of people cited on the site mentioned by Hydro. For Socorro Burajuba, as she is also known, the residents attest that there has been no compliance with the measures provided for in the TAC to repair the socio-environmental damage caused by the company.

"We are taking water with poisonous chemicals that Hydro pumps into the river," says quilombola.

"The TAC has not been executed. We were never attended by a toxicologist doctor. We never had medicine to treat and remove this metal from our blood. They said they were going to give us water, but they only gave it to some people, six bottles a week. But they didn't treat our water. It must be said that the problem is not only from 2018, but every day, since before 2018, as to the present date, we are still taking water with chemical poison that Hydro pumps into the river. It uses our water, but returns contaminated water to the river - that is clear. Our institutions, IEC and UFPA, have already done the reports. We don't have lice in our heads, nor worms. We have metals in our blood and every day we die a little bit!”, says the leadership.

Socorro points out that the consequences of the neglect with the population has led to a series of health problems that only get worse over the years. She highlights the recurrent births of children with malformations, tooth loss, memory loss, kidney problems, shortness of breath, and fatigue as common symptoms in most of the residents. Many of them were examined by the IEC at the time of the flooding, but they did not have access to any treatment - which was provided for in the TAC and should have been promoted by Hydro.

"People don't have the medical toxicologist that they should have had, both for those who have already been tested and for those who have yet to be tested.

We had people who had to go to Belem to ask for help to get treatment, when we could have the treatment in our community. We are dying. Brazil will have an irreparable loss with our loss. Will the quilombola have a future generation?", asks Socorro.

"Almost nothing of the TAC was fulfilled," says MP of Barcarena

For the Public Ministry of Barcarena, it is a fact that the mining company did not comply with the TAC as it should have. The municipal prosecutor, Renato Belini Costa, confirms that he has been monitoring compliance with the TAC and attests that almost nothing has been done by the company: "They failed to comply with basically all the clauses that depended on an audit. Almost all the community service clauses were not complied with. They also did nothing about safety and stability of the solid waste dumps, foreseen in clause three. It seems that they just hired a company this year to start studies to fulfill this part in the distant future. Nothing has been done either with regard to alternative systems of treatment and collective distribution of drinking water of river water assessment systems assessment balneability assessment assessment, air quality air quality. In short, almost nothing was accomplished and all the deadlines were exceeded "he says.

Among the determinations of the second clause, which deals with service to the community, only one was fulfilled "in part", highlights the prosecutor: "It was 2.1.2, which defined the payment of a minimum wage to the affected families for a period of 12 months. According to the company, the payment was made in four stages since 2018, through a registration that they did and people earned a food allowance. Once a year they were earning an amount and the last payment was in March this year," says the prosecutor.

However, according to the housewife and resident of the Burajuba community, Damiana Oliveira dos Santos Silva, this payment did not refer to a minimum wage, did not last the stipulated period and did not include all the families in the community. For some, who were even contacted by Hydro, they still had to choose between receiving the financial benefit, in the form of food aid, or receiving mineral water, suitable for consumption:

"There was the TAC that they did right? But some people got it, others didn't. And those who got the aid didn't get the water, and those who got the water didn't get the aid that they gave for three or five months for some people, but this resource doesn't exist anymore. Here at home we didn't get any help at all, not for food, nor for water. We buy water to drink when we can. When we can't, it's the contaminated water. We used to have a well, but we had to stop using it, because it contaminated everything", says Damiana.

The Barcarena Prosecutor justifies the situation by saying that he is not able to do more for the community: "on behalf of the MPPA, I do my best to follow up on the TAC and inspect, but it is very difficult because I don't have the adequate structure to be there, doing inspections. The Barcarena MP does not have the structural capacity to inspect and follow up on the TAC to the satisfaction of the community, since there is no specialized public prosecutor's office for this", he said.

Risks of lead and nickel

Elements such as leader and nickel can cause a range of abnormalities in the human body. Lead severely affects brain function, blood, kidneys, digestive and reproductive systems, including the possibility of producing genetic mutations in offspring. 

Nickel, in turn, causes hypersensitivity in the oral cavity, cell alteration and death, and contact dermatitis, besides having significant potential to induce genetic mutations and cause cancer.

SOURCE: Agência Senado and Unievangélica