Helter-Smelter

Nationalistic pride is what we lack. Self-servient agendas are what we are full of. Even the vocal environmental activists among us have agendas of their own. Many are into furthering their ambitions by riding on the coattails of an environmental movement. We are not France, or Chile, or Ecuador where, if the government trods on the rights and freedoms of its citizens, marches involve millions and countries shut down. I am waiting to see that sort of Nationalistic synergy happen here. Businessmen are too greedy making money, and the rest of us too lazy to care about any cause that may inherently require some sacrifice on our part to meet its goal.

Trinidad and Tobago is ranked third in the world in carbon dioxide emissions per capita population. We have not ratified the Kyoto Protocol. We have no environmental law mandating a phased curtailment of carbon dioxide emissions. Recent evidence presented at The American Association for the Advancement of Science (February 16, 2006) all but confirmed global warming theory and put the finger squarely on the shoulder of industry as the cause. We are about to build an aluminium smelter with a carbon dioxide output of 240,000 tonnes per annum. Aluminium smelters alone are responsible for 1% of the world's total carbon dioxide output. The Environmental Management Authority: arbiter of Trinidad's environmental policy is a government body. A rather large conflict of interest, I would think! Who will protect us from the vagaries of government policy? Panday? No. Kirk Meighoo? No. Ramesh Maharaj? No. Have a Parliamentary debate? Waste of time. Always looking for the easy way out, we just sit and wait, hoping that someone else will do our job for us.

Of course, the activists will rally and decry my ignorance. Are they not fighting for a cause for all of us? Have they not accomplished much? A hundred people march in Chatham, or, the population being sensitised in the media about the issues? All true. But guess what? The government will build the smelter anyway.

Who knows the true story about this smelter business anyway? I have read opinions from Alcoa, the environmentalists, economists abroad, indigenous peoples (who have had their lives and habitats decimated by bauxite mining in South America, which we will perpetuate by building a smelter), local writers on both sides of the fence. Who is right? What are the true risks and benefits? The views are so polarised right now that rational discourse is doomed. Maybe the government really does have our best interest at heart. Indeed, environmentalists are well known for their propensity to select and to skew data to support their points of view. Is that the case here?

Certainly, if I can be asking these questions, then I am certainly not the only one asking them. Certainly, until these questions are answered, and the impact on people's health and the environment unequivocally investigated, there can be no clearing of lands at Chatham. It is too late for Union Village, unfortunately. The Prime Minister pontificates that the construction of the smelter is "a done deal". Well, maybe in his mind.

How to proceed? My hope is that it will be done through the courts; even as a civil case brought against the state. Every legal avenue must be explored. Marches are a waste of time. Public sensitisation, although necessary, should not be the main focus. The main focus is to stop all construction activities until the matter is decided by a court of law. We are not France, or Chile, or Ecuador. We are Trinidad and Tobago, where different approaches apply. Trinidad Dreamscape has also tried the protest and complain route as regards to an environmental matter concerning the Water and Sewerage Authority (WASA) dumping refuse illegally. Nothing worked until we hired the services of a law firm. It took just one warning letter to solve the problem. Use the law. It works. And it may be the only thing that can save Chatham.

Talk is cheap. Just like this article, talk usually accomplishes nothing on the scale that we envision for it. I just thought that those concerned with this matter seemed to be running about helter-s(m)elter trying to get something done. I guess that we are so used to doing nothing that, to do anything at all, is a big deal. If that's the case, then prepare to breathe in and inhale those flouride emissions! Yummy.

April 10, 2006 - UPDATE

So much for giving the government the benefit of the doubt. I have just seen footage of the Joint Select Committee of Parliament quizzing the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Energy on AluTrin and Alcoa. Apparently, Alcoa and Alutrin did feasibility studies on their respective projects that the government is using to base its policy. This is just beyond belief. The government has done no feasibility study of its own, nor has it done an environmental impact study, nor has it done a projected study on natural gas use (a depletable resource), nor has it determined how much Alcoa will have to pay for our natural gas. The list goes on. Where is the massive public pressure to make the government do the right thing? I only see small clusters of resistance. Do we have an educated population or have they all migrated? A rhetorical question, I suppose.

This government seems to have the sympathies of a vast portion of the population. Party politics, ethnic and tribal associations run the affairs of Trinidad. Matters that would be of concern to voters of a first-world country are irrelevant here. So be it then.


1000 acres of forest cleared at Union Village for smelter number 1. Many residents (PNM activists) are pleased. We can only pity them, and their children.