Author: Nicola Mulinaris

The NGOs consider the deliberate dumping an environmental tragedy as the heavy metals and the PCBs will continue to leach into the marine environment in the foreseeable future. The sister ship of the SÃO PAULO, the CLEMENCEAU, was found to contain several hundred tonnes of PCB-contaminated material on board when it was recycled in the UK years ago. PCBs are extremely toxic and persistent chemicals that have been banned for many years due to their propensity to cause harm to wildlife and contaminate the food chain after being ingested by fish and other marine animals.

It was 2022 when the NGO Shipbreaking Platform noticed numerous discrepancies and irregularities regarding the amounts of hazardous materials onboard in the paperwork prepared before the export of the SÃO PAULO to a recycling yard in Turkey. Brazilian authorities refused to make any corrections and, instead, released the vessel in August. As the ship was almost ready to enter the Mediterranean Sea, the Turkish government, however, agreed with the environmentalists and withdrew its consent to receive it until a more thorough assessment of the hazards onboard could be independently conducted. At that point, as per the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal, Brazil recalled the ship presumably for safe management. Yet, when the SÃO PAULO returned, rather than being directed back to the Rio de Janeiro base from where it had departed, the Navy refused to allow it to dock there or at any other Naval base. Months passed with other states and commercial ports likewise refusing entry, as the owner begged for relief after towing the ship at sea for 3 months, burning fuel and money. On January 13, a survey was suddenly conducted showing water leaking into the vessel. The ship was given about 4 more weeks by the salvage master before it might no longer be safe to move it. Once again, the Navy refused to bring it to the dock for repair. Instead, on January 20, the Navy suddenly forced the convoy 200 miles further off-shore, announcing soon after the intention to sink the vessel. An attempt to obtain an injunction against the sinking failed. Now the SÃO PAULO has been sunk, still without explanation as to why the Navy never brought its old ship to base -- the obvious legal and logical solution.

What the Navy has done violated three international environmental treaties. First, failure to bring a ship returned from an aborted transboundary movement of waste back into the territory of the exporting State for safe management is a violation of the Basel Convention. Second, disposing of PCBs in the sea is a violation of the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants. Third, dumping ships at sea without first cleaning them of toxic substances is a violation of the London Convention and Protocol.

While the environmental harm from dumping the many tons of asbestos on board the ship in the marine environment is unknown, based on the estimates of the sister ship of the SÃO PAULO -- the CLEMENCEAU, the ship is believed to contain more than 300 metric tonnes of PCB-laden materials in concentrations over 50ppm. PCBs are an extremely harmful contaminant of the marine environment due to their chronic toxicity and the capacity of the chemical to biomagnify its concentrations as it moves up the marine food chain.  

Under the terms of the Stockholm Convention, POPs such as PCBs must be disposed of in such a way that the POP content is destroyed or irreversibly transformed, so they no longer exhibit the characteristics of POPs. Methods for the safe disposal of POPs have been developed and listed  by the Stockholm and Basel Conventions, and ocean disposal is not an allowed method.  Furthermore, the London Protocol prohibits the disposal of ships at sea without first thoroughly cleaning them of hazardous materials such as PCBs. 

The early claim by Brazil and the ship owner that the SÃO PAULO did not contain PCBs, while the sister ship CLEMENCEAU clearly did, has never been substantiated in any way and was but one of the suspicious claims made in the Inventory of Hazardous Materials performed by surveyors working for the Turkish buyer of the ship. On the contrary, evidence exists to suggest otherwise. When the CLEMENCEAU was surveyed in 2006 by Bureau Veritas, PCBs were found in the wiring and gaskets in high concentrations. The surveyors were alarmed enough to surmise that all the cabling and wiring in the ship was likely contaminated. The Bureau Veritas’ report stated:  “All cables (old or more recent, of any use) of the first type have a content greater than the regulation threshold, with some of them having very high content (for example, 23,350 mg/kg). 71% of the cable casings (old or more recent, of any use) of the second type have a content greater than the regulation threshold, with some having very high content (for example, 41,000 mg/kg). It is recommended that the electric cables be considered polluted by PCBs. Specific precautions are to be taken concerning cutting and handling.” 

From a YouTube video of what appears to be the decommissioning ceremony on board the ship in 2018, one can see a freeze frame of a central corridor.  Compare this to an archived photo of the CLEMENCEAU’s central corridor. It shows the same harnesses of cables in both ships. Further, the gaskets throughout the ship were also found to be contaminated with PCBs.  There has been no record of removal of the wiring or gasketry on board the SÃO PAULO since decommissioning.   

BAN is citing the illegal seizure of a privately owned ship, as well as defiance of the Basel Convention. The latter requires the aircraft carrier to be safely returned to Brazil with Brazilian assistance, which the Navy has refused for three months. The London Protocol further forbids the intentional sinking of vessels unless all efforts have been first made to rid the ships of toxic waste residual materials such as heavy metals, asbestos and PCBs.    

In a meeting held on 29 December, a Navy representative already alluded  to a possible contingency action of sinking the ship.  At that meeting, the issue of the small leak in the SÃO PAULO’s hull was discussed and it was concluded that the ship was not in imminent danger of sinking but should still be returned to a Brazilian port to undergo repairs prior to being put out to bid again for recycling. Following that meeting and a few weeks after the Lula Administration was installed, the coalition of NGOs wrote a letter to the new Minister of the Environment and Climate Change and to the director of IBAMA, the Brazilian Agency responsible for fulfilling Brazil's legal obligations under international law. The NGOs also issued a press release calling for the urgent safe docking of the vessel, fearing that it would indeed be abandoned by the Turkish owners. Within 24 hours of that press release, the Brazilian Navy, citing imminent hazard to the Brazilian population and environment inexplicably seized the vessel and seemingly forced a commercial tow ship to take it out to sea. 

In addition to the economic loss of a vast quantity of secondary steel the SÃO PAULO contains, a forced sinking by the Brazilian government would result in hundreds of tonnes of asbestos, toxic and persistent PCBs, heavy metal-laden paints and possible radioactive materials to be released into the marine environment in violation of international law (London Protocol) [1].

NOTE

[1] Studies conducted at a US sinking site revealed toxic PCB leaching from a sunken aircraft carrier. According to the data, the leaching occurred at more than twice the US Navy and EPA’s pre-sinking modelled expectations. Leaching PCBs from the sunken vessel were found to be taken up by fish at the reef site, with an increase of concentrations in fish samples of 1,446% on average from pre-sinking to post- sinking.. As PCBs bioaccumulate in organisms and biomagnify in the food chain, they create health risks to organisms of all kinds. Due to PCB’s properties of persistence and toxicity, many scientists believe there is no safe level of exposure to PCBs. See BAN's report.

For more information:

Jim Puckett, Basel Action Network, e-mail: jpuckett@ban.org, Phone: +1 206-354-0391

Ingvild Jenssen, NGO Shipbreaking Platform, e-mail: ingvild@shipbreakingplatform.org, Phone: +32 (0)260.94.419

In their letter, the coalition laid out the requirements for proper and safe recycling of the vessel, which upon the decision to scrap it becamehazardous waste under the Basel Convention.  The groups reiterated the need for a full, independent, and transparent inventory of the hazardous materials (IHM) found onboard the ship, especially the asbestos, heavy metal-laden paints, PCBs, and the possible presence of radioactive isotopes. They also stated that the ship should not return to Aliaga, Turkey, where it was originally destined, following oposition by local communities and authorities due to the large amounts of hazardous materials onboard and concerns that these will not be managed in a safe manner, putting workers’and community health at risk. The NGOs also warned the government that the ship should not be scuttled or sunk to become an “artificial reef” or any other form of deliberate sinking, which the Brazilian Navy shockingly discussed as a possibility in a December 29 inter-agency meeting.

For more information:

Jim Puckett, Basel Action Network, e-mail: jpuckett@ban.org, Phone: +1 206-354-0391

NGO Shipbreaking Platform, e-mail: nicola@shipbreakingplatform.org, Phone: +32 (0)260.94.419