“Givigudet” Attended The Working Meeting on the Air Quality Improvement Plan
“Givigudet” Attended The Working Meeting on the Air Quality Improvement Plan
On May 19th, the “Gavigudet” team attended the third meeting of the working group promoting the improvement of atmospheric air quality in the central zone.
The purpose of the working group is to prepare an atmospheric air quality management plan.
The development of the plan is in its final stages and will soon be available for the public and all interested parties for comments and notes. The meeting will most likely be held in hybrid mode so that citizens have the opportunity to attend. We think that this practice should be established during public deliberations in order to increase the participation of citizens in such meetings.
The first deliberation of the working group was held on December 8, 2022, and the second was held on February 3rd, 2023. At the deliberation, our movement raised a number of problems for Rustavi, which we would like to solve within the framework of this plan. Most of the issues raised are reflected in the relevant activities of the action plan.
However, some issues remain unsolved. These are the issues, that could not be addressed in this plan or have not yet been decided in what form they will be reflected.
For example, we raised the issue of “load norm” for the city, because some of the existing enterprises in the city are increasing their productivity or opening additional enterprises.
The opening of factories is good news in itself, but in a city where the air is already catastrophically polluted, it should be determined what types of factories can be permitted what types of factories can no longer be opened, or in case of increased productivity, what measurements should be taken.
If such enterprises are built in Rustavi (or increase their productivity), which also contribute to the generation of a large amount of dust, then the installation of filters by the existing enterprises will no longer be enough to regulate the situation.
As we were told at the deliberation, this issue was also discussed with European experts, who said that similar practices are not known in European countries. Therefore, at this stage, no activity could be developed that would respond to this challenge. However, we think that it is necessary to address this issue.
Once again our team raised the issue of (Rustavi-Tbilisi) transportation, and the representatives of the Ministry confirmed to us again, that this issue will be included in the action plan for improving the atmospheric air quality of the Tbilisi agglomeration, and during the development of the plan, Rustavi Municipality’s mayor’s office and our movement will be invited.
At the previous deliberation, one of the issues we discussed was the problem of slag storage and dusting result. This issue is no longer recorded as a separate activity, because according to the Ministry, attention is already being paid to this issue during inspections. Unfortunately, the problem remains unsolved.
During the meeting, we once again emphasized the need to increase the number of inspections and the so-called ‘patrolling/circumventing’ practices to make the process more effective.
Also, we once again raised the issue of the need to optimize the system of collecting referral statistics in medical institutions, so that patients from our city would not be included in Tbilisi’s statistics, and we would know the impact of polluted air on the increased number of diseases. According to the Ministry, this is such an extensive issue (a separate task) that it goes beyond the scope of this action plan, therefore this issue was not included as a separate activity. However, it is gratifying that in order to improve the ability to assess the impact of atmospheric air pollution on public health, based on the research, an assessment of the exposure of the population of the central zone to excess concentrations of atmospheric air pollutants (PM10, PM2.5, NO2) established by the Georgian legislation will be prepared. Also, indicators for assessing air pollution’s impact on humans will be developed. The National Center for Disease Control and Public Health will be responsible for this activity.
Let us remind you, that for the purpose of air quality management, the territory of Georgia is divided into zones and agglomerations. The central zone unites 12 municipalities, including Rustavi.
In the working version of the plan, we read that according to the data of 2021, a total of 18,341 tons of particulate matter were dispersed into the environment from stationary sources of atmospheric air pollution in the central zone, the largest share of dispersed solid particles ( 70.7%) Coming to Rustavi. Accordingly, the activities described in the action plan for the central zone are largely adapted to the needs of Rustavi.