the toxic truth - Greenpeace

the toxic truth
Basel regime.
There was sufficient reason for the Dutch
authorities to consider the probability that the
waste in question was hazardous and not a
MARPOL waste, and that the Basel Convention
and the European Waste Shipment Regulation
should be applicable to any movement of it
across national borders.
However, even accepting the fact that the
authorities failed to consider the Basel
regime, if they had properly applied the
MARPOL regime, they should still have acted
differently.
Failure to properly implement
the MARPOL Convention and the
EU Directive on Port Reception
Facilities
As noted above, the Basel Convention applies
to hazardous waste but does not apply to
the “wastes which derive from the normal
operations of a ship”. 512 These are covered
by the MARPOL Convention. 513 The purpose
of the MARPOL Convention is to regulate the
discharge of harmful substances into the
sea. Harmful substances must be discharged
to a “reception facility”. 514 Had the Dutch
authorities applied the MARPOL regime and
associated EU law correctly, the disaster at
Abidjan could still have been avoided.
The EU Directive on Port Reception Facilities,
which implements the MARPOL Convention,
requires member states to ensure the availability
of adequate port reception facilities, which
should be capable of receiving the types and
quantities of ship-generated waste and cargo
residues from ships normally using that port. 515
Article 7 of the EU Directive on Port Reception
Facilities deals with the delivery of shipgenerated
waste. 516 Article 7 requires the
master (captain) of a ship calling at an EU
port to deliver all ship-generated waste to a
port reception facility before leaving the port.
It does allow for some exceptions: “A ship
may proceed to the next port of call without
delivering the ship-generated waste, if there
is sufficient dedicated storage capacity
for all ship-generated waste that has been
accumulated and will be accumulated during
the intended voyage of the ship until the port
of delivery.” 517 (emphasis added)
Even if the authorities had fully accepted the
false information provided by Trafigura about
the waste, and considered that they were
dealing with “normal” ship-generated waste,
which could therefore be kept on board if there
were sufficient storage capacity, two critical
issues should have been noted.
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Chapter 9