Jan 05 2005
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ALCOA’s Alarming Record on Pollution

Alcoa, Inc. is one of the worst polluters on the planet. They are at the forefront of poisoning the air, land and water of Texas, the most heavily polluted state in the nation. Alcoa has grandfathered facilities exempt from the 1971 Clean Air Act. In Texas alone, it has several hundred plants that are accountable for the mounting pollution problems of the state.

Rockdale, Texas, located around 50 miles east of Austin, is home to a plant that sprawls over 7,000 acres and runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It is powered by four on-site power plants, three of which were built before the Clean Air Act of 1971 was approved. It contributes to the pollution problems in Austin and the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. The aluminum smelter here discharges roughly 104,000 tons of air emissions per year, including over 60,000 tons of acid rain.

Alcoa says that if it were forced to comply with state and national clean air laws, the alterations in equipment would be so expensive that the company would be forced to shut down the Rockdale plant; instead of doing this, they’ll keep the plant running and contaminate the area.

Between the years 1983 to 1987 at a time when they were under scrutiny to maintain clean facilities, Alcoa spent $62 million to upgrade their facilities without consent from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) nor the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission (TNRCC), blatantly violating federal law. Large increases in air pollution ensued in 1988, including nitrous oxides, particulate matter (which contain human carcinogens), carbon monoxide, and an annual increase of 13,000 tons of sulfur dioxide since completion of the modifications. Although Alcoa blatantly violated federal law, neither the EPA nor the TNRCC pressed charges.

Since 1987, more than forty-seven Alcoa facilities have been cited for pollution violations by state and federal regulators. In one instance when the EPA opposed Alcoa, they along with the Justice Department filed claims against the company as reported March 14, 2000. In the agreement, Alcoa consented to pay about $8.8 million to clean the Mississippi River Basin, reduce hazardous waste generation, and research new air pollution reduction technology.

In Port Allen, LA, Discovery Aluminas, Inc., an Alcoa subsidy, pleaded guilty to contaminating the water and was fined over one million dollars by the state and the federal government. In Point Comfort, TX, Alcoa was fined $181,400 for emission violations in its bauxite refining plant.

Alcoa was also cited for illegal export practices. They shipped potassium fluoride and sodium fluoride to Jamaica and Suriname on 50 separate occasions without obtaining the required Commerce export licenses, then lied about it. They were hit with a $750,000 civil penalty.

Source- www.utwatch.org/corporations/alcoa.html

Alcoa to pay $550,000 settlement for water pollution at Indiana plant
LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Alcoa Inc. will pay $550,000 to settle a federal lawsuit alleging the aluminum maker’s aerospace products plant violated water pollution limits.

Source-U.S. Water News Online February 2002

ABC News, December 23, 2004 -A Perth magistrate has imposed a $60,000 fine on mining company Alcoa for polluting the air around its Wagerup refinery. Alcoa pleaded guilty to the pollution charge that related to Bauxite residue dust blowing over Wagerup and Yarloop, south of Perth, in November 2002.

Source – www.minesandcommunities.org/Action/press513.htm

Jan 04 2005
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Sigur Rós Support the International Protest

jonsiarrest

Icelandic band Sigur Ros have voiced their anger over the destruction of Iceland and have made clear their support for the international call for massive protests in the Icelandic highlands next summer.

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Nov 27 2004

Icelandic Embassy in London Invaded

Saving Iceland, London, 26 November 2004

Eleven courageous British activists visited the Icelandic embassy to voice their outrage at the building of the Kárahnjúkar dams.

One activist persuaded the secretary to open the “security” door, and while 4 others charged in, another locked herself by the neck to the main door with a D-lock. Three of the four inside the embassy were almost immediately arrested, and the fire brigade used bolt croppers to release the woman on the front door (she too was arrested). Police and staff thought they had cleared the building of intruders, until post-it notes started to appear on a window spelling out ‘NO DAM’. Investigating, they found that an activist had locked and barricaded himself inside an office. The fire brigade were asked to break in, at which point the activist came out willingly and was arrested, as were the others, for “trespassing on diplomatic premises”. The 5 were held overnight. Read More

Sep 23 2004
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Self-Sustaining Destruction!

ultimatethe ultimate fraud 

Facts of interest circulated by members of NatureWatch to participants at the meeting of The International Partnership for the Hydrogen Economy in Reykjavik 23rd September 2004

The Government of Iceland is presently damming muddy glacial rivers and building the gigantic power plant Kárahnjúkar (690 MW). The enormous main reservoir of 57 km2 will destroy an area of pristine wilderness and beauty. For months each summer, when the water-level is low, it will leave a huge area covered with a thick layer of powdery dust that will spread over a vast area. The dam will be filled with sediment in approximately 50-100 years, leaving irreversibly damaged land. Such dams are not eco-friendly. Read More

Sep 08 2004

Australian Greens Challenge ALCOA

7th September 2004

Senator Bob Brown will bring his Franklin River experience to help stop a huge dam being built in eastern Iceland.

Announcing in Sydney today Greens backing for the global campaign to stop the Iceland Energy Authority’s huge Karahnjukar Dam and the Alcoa smelter it will feed, Senator Brown said the scenario is very similar to Tasmania’s Franklin River experience.

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Sep 08 2004

Australian Greens join Iceland’s dam-busters

7 September 2004

Alcoa challenged to back Kyoto ratification.

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Aug 06 2004

“A Handful of Men Imposing their Destructive Dream on a Nation which Seems Half-Asleep”

Robert Jackson

So writes the poet and protester Elísabet Jökulsdóttir, and sitting in the board room of Landsvirkjun at a table long enough to hold a state banquet, it is hard to disagree with who is responsible for Kárahnjúkar. The walls of the ‘president’s floor’ have portraits of the men who in former times have managed the national power company. Read More

Aug 04 2004

Kárahnjúkar – Some Facts About the Project

Robert Jackson

It is now two years since the government gave the approvals that made way for the creation of a huge hydroelectric scheme in the Central Highlands at Kárahnjúkar. This paved the way for a subsequent deal with Alcoa for the building of an aluminium smelter in the coastal town of Reyðarfjörður.

WHAT DOES THE SCHEME INVOLVE?

The Kárahnjúkar project will consist of nine dams, three reservoirs, seven channels and sixteen tunnels. It will divert two large rivers, the Jökulsá á brú and Jökulsá í Fljótsdal, and several smaller rivers to the north of the Vatnajökull glacier, the largest glacier in Europe. The main dam will be highest rockfill dam in Europe, 190 metres high, 800 metres long and 600 metres wide at its base. This main dam will create a huge reservoir, to be called Hálslón, which will flood a wilderness area of 57 sq. km. 70 km of tunnels will carry water to an underground powerhouse, which will have a 690 megawatts capacity. Read More

Jul 21 2004
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The Bad Neighbor – Alcoa’s Dirty Dealing in Central Texas by Esther Cervantes

0704cover“…some Alcoa Rockdale employees… were offered a choice between early retirement or transfer to Iceland.” So much for job creation for the people of Eastern Iceland!

Dollars and Sence
The Magazine for Economic Justice

Issue #254, July/August 2004

Earlier this year, the Aluminum Company of America (Alcoa) broke ground on the $83 million Three Oaks lignite mine outside Austin. The mine will provide coal to Alcoa’s massive facility near the town of Rockdale: an aluminum smelter plus the three power plants that fire it. In addition to the lignite, Alcoa intends to remove groundwater from the new mine (as well as from its existing mine at Sandow, near Rockdale) and ship it to the city of San Antonio, more than 100 miles away. In a company report celebrating the Rockdale smelter’s first 50 years, manager Geoff Cromer thanks the facility’s neighbors for “the strong support we have received from the community”—but that’s less than half the story. The “several hundred people” who “took time from their jobs” to attend numerous public hearings and “provide comment in support of Alcoa and this project” were far outnumbered by those who struggled against it for four years. Read More

Apr 28 2004

The Spin Doctor Is In: Examining Corporate PR at Bechtel by A.C. Thompson

CorpWatch
April 28, 2004

In the face of criticism over its controversial construction projects (including the illegal ALCOA smelter in Reydarfjordur), Bechtel has taken media manipulation to the next level, employing a three-pronged approach to weaving a rosy story for the public and investors.

bechtelcartoon 

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