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| Sunday, 11 September 2005 |
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Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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Environment Landslides continue threatening life in the hills by Shanika Sriyananda
This family including four-year-old Vicky and three-month-old Jesmine could have been easily saved from the earthslip if the local authorities had taken steps to evacuate villagers in the area and, if the owners of the tea estate acted with responsibility by constructing retaining structures to hold against the slope as recommended by the National Building Research Organisation (NBRO). The NBRO first warned about a possible landslide in the location in 1999 and proposed several remedial measures to prevent a disaster. The 'Report on unstable slope at Rassagala Estate, Balangoda' by NBRO states that the waste materials (mainly ash) from the factory, which is 500 to 600 metres above mean sea level, was discharged over the slope for a long time, creating an artificial overburden. According to this report, there was water infiltration into the upper region of the slope without proper drainage added with broken gutters flowing directly from the roof of the tea factory. "During the monsoon period, particularly when the rain is likely to continue unabated, the potential of slide will be higher, affecting the areas adjacent to the tea factory. The same situation might arise due to the water flow from damaged pipes and drains through the area for a continuous period", it clearly states. The NBRO scientists while suggesting the construction of retaining structures to protect existing unprotected slopes, also recommended to improve the drainage system within the entire area, to prevent water ingress into the overburden, to repair and thoroughly seal all the damaged water pipes or to be relocated completely, to direct the inflow of water from the roof away from the unstable slope, and to stabilize the toe of the slope. The NBRO, consists of seven scientists who have already completed mapping out landslide hazard zones in four districts, and commenced in another four districts. Mapping for Hambantota and Kalutara districts will commence in 2007. "The landslide prone areas in four districts - Badulla, Nuwara Eliya, Ratnapura and Kegalle are clearly marked and the maps are available in all Divisional Secretaries, local authorities and at the NBRO Head Office", Scientist, Landslide and Services Division K. N. Badara says. With limited resources of manpower and latest technology, he says the NBRO is doing a satisfactory service to prevent future disasters. According to NBRO, over 70 per cent of hill slopes in the country are now under the threat of sliding due to man-made activities like unauthorised and unplanned constructions, cutting down trees, adhoc cultivations and accelerated soil erosion caused by inappropriate land use. "We cannot predict the exact time and dates of their occurrences. Since they are natural occurrences a landslide can happen now or tomorrow or in several years time. The things we can do are to identify the landslide prone areas considering the geological, hydrological, geomorphologic and geotechnical conditions of the areas and to recommend mitigatory measures to local authorities", he adds. However, according to Bandara the scientists give estimated time frames, especially to evacuate villagers from the 'danger zones'. "The problem is, the local authorities and Divisional secretariats do not pay attention to any of the warning signs, and do not take action to evacuate people during the given time frame", he claims. In the year 1998 the NBRO warned about a possible landslide in 2002 in Naugala in the Kegalle district and asked to evacuate the people. The lack of interest by the responsible government agencies to listen to the NBRO and evacuate people from the village resulted in two deaths and the destruction of some houses. If the responsible authorities hsd adhered to the NBRO's recommendations 31 people in Matara district, 11 in Kalutara district, 94 in Ratnapura district and 11 in Hambantota district would not have died in 2003. 'Most' of the important reports sent to 'most' of the government institutions are locked inside cupboards and gather dust while hundreds of poor villagers die and become homeless. In constructing human settlements close to factories, especially in identified 'natural disaster-prone areas' a huge responsibility lies in the hands of Divisional Secretaries and local authorities when approving such constructions. But according to NBRO scientists, these recommendations, which came after thorough scientific research, were totally neglected and most of the new constructions have come up on these areas. "If the slopes were not disturbed there will be no threats of landslides", says Bandara. According to Bandara, the responsible agencies still do not follow the guidelines issues by the NBRO for constructions in the landslide prone areas. "Most of them do not stick to guidelines and just give the approval for construction on hill slopes without any scientific study about stability", he claims. He says that most of the minor landslides could be easily avoided by minimising haphazard development activities on hill slopes. However, these important scientific studies and predictions on landslide prone areas cannot be overlooked easily as they deal with the life and death of poor villagers and their hard earned properties. The NBRO's recommendations to prevent landslides were not taken into consideration by the tea factory owners in Rassagala, and for the past six years they have not taken a single remedial measure to make the slope stable. One major lapse is the lack of a powerful authority to monitor the mitigation measures taken by the responsible authorities to prevent landslides, following the NBRO's recommendations, and to bring to look those who do not evacuate people from the landslide prone sites to save innocent lives. Apes 'extinct in a generation' Some of the great apes - chimps, gorillas, and orangutans - could be extinct in the wild within a human generation, a new assessment concludes.
The World Atlas of Great Apes and their Conservation is published by the UN's environment and biodiversity agencies. It brings together data from many sources in an attempt to assess comprehensively the prospects for the remaining great apes; the gorillas, chimpanzees and bonobos of Africa, and the orangutans of south-east Asia. "All of the great apes are listed as either endangered or critically endangered," co-author Lera Miles from the World Conservation Monitoring Centre near Cambridge said. Critically endangered means that their numbers have decreased, or will decrease, by 80% within three generations. One critically endangered species is the Sumatran orangutan, of which around 7,300 remain in the wild. (BBC News) Methane's impact on climate change Scientists face difficult challenges in predicting and understanding how much our climate is changing. When it comes to gases that trap heat in our atmosphere, called greenhouse gases (GHGs), scientists typically look at how much of the gases exist in the atmosphere.
"The gas molecules undergo chemical changes and once they do, looking at them after they've mixed and changed in the atmosphere doesn't give an accurate picture of their effect," Shindell said. The leading greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and halocarbons. These gases are called 'well mixed' greenhouse gases because of their long lifetimes of a decade or more, which allows them to disperse evenly around the atmosphere. They are emitted from both man-made and natural sources. Ozone in the lower atmosphere, called tropospheric ozone, a major component of polluted air or smog that is damaging to human and ecosystem, also has greenhouse warming effects. In the upper atmosphere, ozone protects life on earth from the sun's harmful ultraviolet rays. According to new calculations, the impacts of methane on climate warming may be double the standard amount attributed to the gas. The new interpretations reveal there methane emissions may account for a third of the climate warming from well-mixed greenhouse gases between the 1750s and today. The IPCC report, which calculates methane's affects once it exists in the atmosphere, states that methane increases in our atmosphere account for only about one sixth of the total effect of well-mixed greenhouse gases on warming. Part of the reason the new calculations give a larger effect is that they include the sizeable impact of methane emissions on tropospheric ozone since the industrial revolution. Tropospheric ozone is not directly emitted, but is instead formed chemically from methane, other hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxides. The IPCC report includes the effects of tropospheric ozone increases on climate, but it is not attributed to particular sources. By categorising the climate effects according to emissions, Shindell and colleagues found the total effects of methane emissions are substantially larger. In other words, the true source of some of the warming that is normally attributed to tropospheric ozone is really due to methane that leads to increased abundance of tropospheric ozone. Sources of methane include natural sources like wetlands, gas hydrates in the ocean floor, permafrost, termites, oceans, freshwater bodies, and non-wetland soils. Fossil fuels, cattle, landfills and rice paddies are the main human-related sources. Previous studies have shown that new rice harvesting techniques can significantly reduce methane emissions and increase yields. (Space mart- EARTH OBSERVATION) User-friendly guidelines for post-tsunami restoration To raise awareness on the importance of conserving coastal habitats and on the need to integrate environmental aspects into the current redevelopment and restoration process, the World Conservation Union (IUCN), in consultation with its members and partners, has prepared a series of information papers incorporating best practice guidelines on how to make post - tsunami restoration work environmentally-friendly and more sustainable. This series of papers available in English, Sinhala and Tamil provide concise and specific guidelines on environmental issues that need to be considered, expected impacts, relevant laws and policies, and key steps to be undertaken on a priority basis. These easy-to-use information papers would be particularly beneficial to those planning, managing, implementing and monitoring rehabilitation and restoration work including government officials, local government officials, donors, International NGOs, local NGOs, politicians, the corporate sector and individuals. The series is being widely disseminated at the grass root level. A list of important contact persons for further information on the topics addressed has also been provided in each paper. These can be downloaded from the IUCN - Sri Lanka website (www.iucnsl.org). or alternately, free copies can be obtained from IUCN Country Office, 53, Horton Place, Colombo 7, Tel: 2682418 or 2694094. The topics are: After the Tsunami: Where to reconstruct. Environmental concerns. 1. Dealing with Invasive Alien Species 2. Materials for reconstruction 3. Beach and Reef clean ups. 4. Solid Waste Management. 5. Recovery of Marine Ecosystems. 6. Restoring tourism - environmental issues. 7. Learning to deal with natural disasters. 8. Knowing about environmental laws and policies. 9. Restoring Terrestrial ecosystems. 10. Water Pollution. 11. Restoring Wetland Ecosystems. 12. Restoring Home Gardens. |
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| Produced by Lake House |
Thiruchelvam, Sumila Devi, Vicky and Jesmine lived in a cramped estate
line room in Rassagala Estate, Ratnapura which disappeared under a heavy
layer of mud last Sunday night. 
Human settlement, logging, mining and disease mean that orangutans in
parts of Indonesia may lose half of their habitat within five years. There
are now more than 20,000 humans on the planet for every chimpanzee. 
However, Drew Shindell, a climatologist at NASA's Goddard Institute for
Space Studies, New York, NY, believes we need to look at the GHGs when they
are emitted at Earth's surface, instead of looking at the GHGs themselves
after they have been mixed into the atmosphere. 
