On March 4, 2022, the IX All-Russian Festival of Nature “Pristine Russia” will open in Moscow. This year, most of the exposition will be devoted to the topic of ecology and the conservation of Russia’s natural resources.
“Walking through the exhibition halls, viewers will be able to see the nature of Russia in all its diversity and splendor. The photographs will tell amazing stories about the world of wildlife, they will take you to places where a human foot rarely sets foot, they will show the secret life of well-known animals and representatives of rare species listed in the Red Book of Russia, and the human impact on the environment. An indelible impression in the soul of every person who is not indifferent to beauty will be left by the landscapes of remote, harsh, but extremely picturesque places of our country – Chukotka, the Far East, the Sea of Japan and the White Sea, Baikal – performed by the country’s best photo artists,” – a brief description of the project.
Also at the exhibition will be presented the direction “Restoration of disturbed ecosystems”. This is an exhibition project of the state corporation Rosatom. The same one that has been dealing with the disposal of waste from Usoliekhimprom for two years now. Well, how does…
Thus, the photographs tell about the liquidation of large objects of accumulated environmental damage and anthropogenic impact on the environment in the Irkutsk region, where the Federal Environmental Operator is implementing two reclamation projects: at the industrial site of the former Usoliekhimprom in Usolye-Sibirskoye and on the territory of the Baikal Pulp and Paper Mill in Baikalsk.
There are no questions for photographers. But to Rosatom….
How can you talk about what you haven’t actually done yet?
Recall that the concern for the waste of two large closed plants was shifted to Rosatom in 2020. And the reclamation project itself will be carried out by a subsidiary of the state corporation Alexei Likhachev – Federal Environmental Operator. The latter tore off more than one contract.
The contractors for the reclamation of the Khimprom site achieved a positive conclusion from the state expertise of the project only on January 22, 2022. That is, it took two years to write it. All this time, the waste lay on the territory of the plant. Moreover, all this time, local residents live in a state of emergency, which was introduced in 2018.
Recall that in two years Rosatom has not disposed of a single gram of waste, but only moved them from one tank to another. And at the end of 2021, numerous violations of the current legislation were revealed during the disposal of waste both at Usoliekhimprom and at other most complex objects of accumulated environmental damage: the BPPM, the Krasny Bor landfill, the city dump in Chelyabinsk.
The activities of the “Federal Ecological Operator” for the treatment of waste of I – IV classes are carried out without a license, which is punishable by Art. 171 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. FEO does not have its own technological solutions, does not have its own specialists for design, does not have a cost justification, while most of the funds allocated from the federal budget are transferred to subcontractors with unacceptably low qualifications and reputation.
All this proves that FEO is not able to competently cope with the task. After all, he had never even had experience working with chemical waste. The company specializes in radioactive.
Therefore, the participation of Rosatom in such a prestigious festival is very doubtful.