Sea Pollution (Hansard, 30 June 1994)

§ Mr. Atkins

The annual joint meeting of the commissions established by the 1972 Oslo convention for the prevention of marine pollution by dumping from ships and aircraft and the 1974 Paris convention for the prevention of marine pollution from land-based sources took place in Karlskrona from 13 to 17 June. The commissions consist of representatives of the contracting parties, which are the littoral states of the north-east Atlantic and the European Community.

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The commissions reviewed progress in implementing the conventions and in bringing into force the 1992 convention on the protection of the marine environment of the north-east Atlantic, and took a number of decisions about their future internal organisations. They adopted the following decisions and recommendations under the conventions—decisions bind those contracting parties that accept them; recommendations have no binding force.

They are:

a. PARCOM Recommendation 94/1 on best available techniques for new aluminium electrolysis plants: adopted by a three-quarters majority with reservations by Germany and the UK; the UK reservation was entered because the recommendation selected only certain features from the agreed description of best available techniques and therefore risked distorting the effects of the description, because the emission limit values were only specified in relation to production volumes and not to total emissions, and because no target date was set for bringing emissions from existing plants within the emission limit values for new plants, which could distort competition;
b. PARCOM Recommendation 94/2 on best available techniques and best environmental practice for the integrated and non-integrated sulphite paper pulp industry: adopted by a three-quarters majority with reservations by France, by Portugal and by the UK (for the same reasons, in part, as with Recommendation 94/1):
c. PARCOM Recommendation 94/3 on best available techniques and best environmental practice for the integrated and non-integrated kraft pulp industry: adopted by a three quarters majority with reservations by France and by the UK (for the same reasons, in part, as with Recommendation 94/1):
d. PARCOM Recommendation 94/4 on best available techniques for the organic chemical industry: adopted by a 687 three-quarters majority with reservations by the UK and Portugal; the UK reservation was entered because the four-page recommendation was too superficial for such a complex subject;
e. PARCOM Recommendation 94/5 concerning best available techniques and best environmental practice for wet processes in the textile processing industry: adopted by a three-quarters majority with reservations by Portugal and by the UK (for the same reasons, in part, as with Recommendation 94/1).
f. PARCOM Decision 94/1 on substances/preparations used and discharged offshore: adopted by a three-quarters majority with reservations by France, by the European Community, by Spain and by the UK; the UK reservation was entered because the decision gave no basis for the selection of the substances named in it and thus cut across the collective work already successfully being undertaken to develop a harrnonised control system;
g. PARCOM Recommendation 94/6 on best environmental practice for the reduction of inputs of potentially toxic chemicals from aquaculture use: adopted by a three-quarters majority with reservations by Belgium, by Spain and by the UK; the UK reservation was entered because the Recommendation does not adequately describe best environmental practice;
h. PARCOM Recommendation 94/7 on the elaboration of national action plans and best environmental practice for the reduction of inputs to the environment of pesticides from agricultural use: adopted unanimously; this Recommendation amended last year's Recommendation on the same subject;
i. PARCOM Recommendation 94/8 concerning environmental impact resulting from discharges of radioactive substances: adopted unanimously; this Recommendation commits the Commissions to further review of the environmental impacts of radioactive discharges, past and present;
j. PARCOM Recommendation 94/9 concerning the management of spent nuclear fuel: adopted unanimously; this Recommendation commits the Commissions to requesting the Nuclear Energy Agency of the OECD to carry out a review of the management of spent nuclear fuel.

The Commissions also discussed a number of other draft recommendations and decisions which failed to achieve a three-quarters majority. These are to be studied further. The Commissions also agreed that the difficulties seen by the United Kingdom in a number of the recommendations and decisions were of importance for establishing future recommendations and decisions, and should be looked into during the forthcoming year.