HELCOM eliminates four major pollution hot spots in the Baltic Sea area

Helsinki, 22 May (HELCOM Information Service) – The Helsinki Commission announced today the elimination of four major pollution hot spots in Baltic Sea area, located in Lithuania and Russia. Following an extensive review of the clean up efforts, experts from the HELCOM Land-based pollution Group have concluded that these hot spots could be removed from the list of the Baltic Sea’s most significant pollution sources. The final decision to take them off the list is expected to be approved by the Meeting of the Heads of Delegation of the HELCOM Member States, which will take place on 9-10 June.

Among the recovered hot spots are Hot Spot No.55 „Panevėžys wastewater treatment plant”, and three sub-hot spots under Hot Spot No.18 in St. Petersburg’s area, including the St. Petersburg South-West Wastewater Treatment Plant, and WWTPs in Pontonny and Repino. All these plants have made major investments in wastewater treatment techniques resulting in a significant reduction of pollution inputs to the Baltic Sea. Another recovered sub-hot spot under Hot Spot No.18 in St. Petersburg’s area, the Kronstadt WWTP, is expected to be taken off the list in November, after providing additional supporting data from 2009.

“Cleaning up the Baltic Sea’s single most significant pollution sources – the so-called Hot Spots - is one of the key tasks of HELCOM,” says Leonid Korovin, Chairman of HELCOM Land-based pollution Group. “The remedial actions at the pollution hot spots should be seen as a major step towards achieving the objective of the HELCOM Baltic Sea Action Plan to drastically reduce pollution and restore the good ecological status of the marine environment by 2021.”

The Hot Spots List of the most significant point sources of pollution around the Baltic Sea was first drawn up under the HELCOM Baltic Sea Joint Comprehensive Environmental Action Programme (JCP) in 1992. The hot spots were designated by an international group of scientists, engineers, environmental managers, financers and government representatives, according to practical economic considerations as well as the seriousness of their impact on the environment and human health. The JCP programme aims to facilitate the implementation of pollution reduction measures at the most polluted sites in the Baltic Sea catchment area. This programme, which should be completed by 2012 at the latest, specifies a series of actions to be undertaken at pollution hot spots. The most notorious hot spots are point sources such as municipal facilities and industrial plants; however, the programme also covers pollution from agricultural areas and rural settlements, as well as sensitive areas where special environmental measures are needed, such as coastal lagoons and wetlands. Certain hot spots have been split into sub-hot spots in order to facilitate their management and actions to reduce pollution. With the latest recoveries, a total of 75 hot spots and sub-hot spots remain on the list, following the deletion of 87 of the earlier identified 162 hot spots/sub-hot spots.

Alleviating pollution at hot spots involves considerable investments. In 1992, it was estimated that total funding of ECU 18 billion would be needed to finance the necessary measures at all the hot spots. Rough current estimates of the total clean up costs for the remaining hot spots amount to EUR 9-11 billion. Investments and remediation projects carried out at pollution hot spots around the Baltic Sea have contributed substantially towards overall pollution load reductions in the Baltic Sea catchment area. Water quality in many coastal waters of the Baltic Sea has improved considerably since 1992, reflecting welcome progress in the treatment of municipal and industrial wastewater. 

While pollution loads from municipal point sources are constantly diminishing and number of respective ‘hot spots’ is reduced every year, agriculture remains a major source of nutrient inputs to the Baltic Sea. Intensified development of industrial production of cattle, pigs and poultry within the Baltic Sea area has led to the decision to create (as part of the Baltic Sea Action Plan) a new segment of pollution point sources, contributing significantly to the amount of nutrient loads. 

At its recent Meeting, held on 18-20 May, the HELCOM Land-based pollution Group reached a key agreement on the Criteria for inclusion/deletion of new agricultural hot spots, as well as on the provisional timetable for establishing the List of new agricultural point-source hot spots, which are not in compliance with the HELCOM requirements, says Mikhail Durkin, Professional Secretary of HELCOM. “The coastal countries agreed to submit the initial national information containing the total number of large farms, as well as their environmental performance and indications for potential sites to be nominated to the Agricultural Hot Spot List by September, and to adopt the List itself by December.”

Note to Editors:

The Baltic Marine Environment Protection Commission, usually referred to as the Helsinki Commission, or HELCOM, is an intergovernmental organisation of all the nine Baltic Sea countries and the EU which works to protect the marine environment of the Baltic Sea from all sources of pollution. 

HELCOM is the governing body of the "Convention on the Protection of the Marine Environment of the Baltic Sea Area," known as the Helsinki Convention.

For more information, please contact:

Mr. Nikolay Vlasov

Information Secretary

HELCOM

Tel: +358 (0)207 412 635

Fax: +358 (0)207 412 639