Most plants do not treat waste water

JAKARTA (JP): Nearly three-quarters of the industrial factories located in Tangerang, West Java, do not have sufficient wastewater treatment plants to deal with toxic waste.

Farida, the head of the environmental division of the Tangerang regency's environmental impact analysis office (Amdal), said here on Friday that about 70 percent of the 1,600 factories there do not have the required technology to process their liquid waste.

Farida admitted that her office, formed only last year, is overwhelmed with the task of monitoring the number of industries discarding liquid waste.

"Apart from budgetary constraints, we lack the expertise and laboratory facilities to conduct a thorough environmental analysis," she said as quoted by Suara Pembaruan.

Under the minister of environment's 1988 decree, toxic waste must be controlled by gauging 34 different parameter levels. However, the Tangerang regency can only gauge four.

Farida said that analyzing a single parameter costs Rp 40,000 (US$18.5), while the laboratory annual budget comes to a mere Rp 5 million (US$2318).

At present, her office can only monitor about 40 small factories which are still using traditional water treatment methods.

Although the traditional method cleanses the contaminated water, it does not separate the toxic from the non-toxic waste and causes the water to foam.

"This kind of water is extremely dangerous to people's health especially to the kidneys," Farida said, warning that if improperly discarded, the water can evaporate and become toxic gas.

Farida identified textile, chemical and metal factories as those notorious for producing dangerous liquid toxins.

Under state law, environmental contamination is punishable by a 10-year jail term, along with a Rp 10 million fine.(mds)