The latest fire incident at a recycling plant in Rayong province is “too repetitive” to past hazardous waste incidents and concerned officials will be called in to explain to the committee as to why
The chair of the Lower House’s Standing Committee on Industry, Akaradej Wongpitakroj, has rebuked industry officials for the latest fire incident at a waste segregation and recycling plant of Win Process Co., Ltd. in Rayong’s Ban Khai district, which broke out on Monday morning and burned much of its hazardous waste in the warehouses, provoking public fears of health impacts that prompted immediate evacuation in more than four communities nearby.
Following up on hazardous waste management issues through various cases filed to his committee including the recent irregular disposal of cadmium waste near Bangkok, Mr. Akaradej said such a fire incident is “too repetitive” to the past incidents that occurred in Ratchaburi and Ayutthaya, designated industrial zones.
If they were the accidents, the industry officials should have placed effective mitigation measures against them in the first place. But the past evidence suggests that they may have been involved with evidence tampering and the officials concerned are just too sluggish in handling the cases. This has enabled the repetition of such an incident to the point that they have apparently become an imitation behaviour, Mr. Akaradej remarked.
The officials at the Ministry of Industry and the Industrial Works Department are in charge of the issue and therefore obliged to prevent such an incident from occurring. If not, “evidence tampering” in hazardous waste disposal will repeat time and again, he said.
The committee’s chair said in some cases the evidence suggested the irregularity clearly but the officials concerned were too sluggish and did not disclose the actions taken against the wrongdoers. This has led to a question as to why they have become too slow over these cases, he said. So, the committee plans to call them in for inquiries pretty soon, he added.
l The chaotic scene at Win Process on Monday morning. Courtesy of Rayong PR Office
Rayong MP of the opposition Move Forward Party, Chutiphong Pipoppinyo, has questioned the incident as it occurred just a few days after the factory was ordered to clear its waste out of the compound following the court order.
Mr. Chutiphong said the Rayong Provincial Industrial Office had sent a letter to the factory dated April 19, demanding it to remove its waste from the factory, but the fire just then broke out on Monday. He said an investigation must be expedited to settle the causes of the fire and the government should pay more attention to the plight of the residents living nearby as nobody can confirm at this point how hazardous the fire and its smoke are. It should also come up with more effective preventive and mitigation measures against such an incident, he said.
PM Srettha Thavisin said he has instructed his cabinet member, Pimphattra Wichaiku, to investigate the incident to see whether it was intentional as speculated or not and look into the whole hazardous waste management system and fix the flaws. As interviewed by the press, the minister conceded that she too was convinced that there might have been some suspicious acts involved in the fire incident and already ordered her officials to look into the case.
Rayong Deputy Governor, Vorachai Thepvorachai, taking command of the situation, convened a meeting yesterday to assess the situation and revealed that the fire was not totally extinguished but still smouldering and could erupt because there are still chemicals inside and some could be flammable. The firefighters will be on standby for the next 24 hours and the chemical experts will be called in to help with the task, he said.
So far, he has issued an order to declare two Tambons of Nong Bua and Bang Butra to be a disaster zone so that the residents can access assistance under the disaster mitigation law. 55 people have been reported of getting sick from the incident, the deputy governor said.
Mr. Vorachai ruled out the possibility of a short circuit, saying the factory had already been closed off for some years. The investigators are looking into the causes of the fire to see whether it’s an arson, the deputy governor said.
Win Process saga
The Ecological Alert and Recovery of Thailand (EARTH), which has been monitoring hazardous waste management in the country, said the fire incident at Win Process’s warehouses is a nightmare for the residents in Nhong Phawa in Tambon Bang Butra close to the factory and they have suffered from the factory’s waste a lot. They are among the group of plaintiffs who filed charges against the factory and just won a libel case a year before.
According to EARTH, Win Process was first complained around 11 years ago as some residents in Bang Butra could not stand some toxic landfills nearby, which were later discovered to be belonged to Win Process. Rayong Court ruled in favor of the residents in 2021, ordering the factory to remove all of its waste out of the compound and in another separate civil court case, the court ruled in favor of the residents last year, ordering the factory to compensate them for their damaged plantations and properties nearby.
Ever since, all the waste had still been kept on the factory’s property until the fire broke out.
As reported by Bangkok Tribune last year, several farm plots in Nhong Phawa community near the plant were contaminated by chemicals and wastewater. Fully grown trees like rubber and betelnuts in the residents’ plantations were left strained and dead. Nhong Phawa reservoir nearby was contaminated to the point that the water could not be of use and a sign imposing a ban on the use of water was erected to warn the residents there.
The Pollution Control Department (PCD) ever inspected the quality of surface and groundwater both around the plant and in farm plots nearby. It found contamination of heavy metal substances in the water, which was also highly acidic.
According to the DIW, which supervises the cleaning efforts, the Rayong Provincial Court on March 25, 2021 issued a ruling, ordering the company to dispose of and treat all the waste at the plant. This includes 4,000 tons of iron dust and slag, 800 tons of liquid and sludge in concrete pits, unidentified liquid chemical waste in containers, contaminated containers and other items found at the plant, plus 14,000 tons of contaminated water in ponds and soil. The deadline for completion was set in March last year.
On December 13, 2022, the residents won the case with the court order instructing Win Process to compensate 15 affected villagers with the sum of 20 million baht plus 3% interest and rehabilitate their contaminated properties as well as the public properties including Nhong Phawa reservoir.
Also read: The Spills: A Close Look into Hazardous Waste Spills and the Clean-ups
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