After years of wrecking havoc on the health of residents of the state, the Rivers State Government has moved to resolve the soot challenges facing it.
The State Government on Friday said it has set up a Technical Committee to implement the recommendations of the scientific committee established to investigate the prevalence of soot.
Commissioner for Environment, Prof Roseline Konya said that the State Government arrived at the decision after a detailed consideration of the report of the Scientific Committee.
Konya explained that the State Executive Council went ahead and appointed members of the Technical committee for purpose of the implementation of the report of the scientific committee
She said that the technical committee is to be chaired by the Honorable Commissioner for Environment and other members including Prof Precious Edeh, Dr. Golden Ohana, the Attorney General and commissioner for Justice, Commissioner of Water resources. Others are representatives of the IOCs. One each from Shell, Agip, Total, Petrol chemical, Port Harcourt refineries and NLNG.
According to her: “There will also be a representative of civil society ,as well as Engineer Juliet Ohunna, while the secretary of the committee will be nominated by the Ministry of Environment”.
The Commissioner said that the Scientific Committee discovered 12 sources of soot. She said that the Technical Committee will work towards addressing the sources of soot.
“The sources of soot are: refineries, fertilizer companies, illegal refineries, setting ablaze of illegally refined petroleum products by the military , tyre burning , gas flaring, meat roasting with used tyres, asphalt plants refuse burning among others”,
She explained that the Rivers State Government has written to the Federal Government to work with the state to tackle aspects that fall within the purview of Federal Agencies .
