Dr Jossy Nkwocha, Head Corporate Communications and Special Adviser to the MD Indorama (right) and Engr. Charles Osuji explaining operations of plants to Journalists,
Okafor Ofiebor /Port Harcourt
The management of Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals limited, Port Harcourt, has declared that with the design of the company’s plants and its compact production procedures, it is impossible for soot to be emitted into the environment in the course of its production activities.
This clarification was made on Monday, January 31 during a guided tour of the company’s plants at Eleme in Eleme local government area of Rivers State by selected journalists.
Dr Jossy Nkwocha, the head of Corporate Communications and Special Adviser to the Managing Director of Indorama explained that journalists were invited to tour the company’s production plants as part of deliberate proactive steps to show to the world that the company does not emit soot.
“We want to show that we are like an open book in our operations, which has a zero policy on emission of soot or pollution of our environment. We do not emit soot whatsoever. The gas we use in powering our plants are bought from Agip and Total companies and we cannot afford to waste them.”
Nkwocha pointed out that despite the fact that no there has not been any official finger-pointing at the company’s production procedures as one of the sources of the emission of cancerous soot in Rivers State.
But he added that it was pertinent to take proactive steps by taking journalists round the plants to have first hand information about how they operate to correct insinuations.
The journalists were earlier briefed by Senior Engineer,Charles Osuji, about the operations of company at the Boardroom before they were taken on a guided tour round the company’s plants.
Osuji explained that plants in the company operate in a compact closed system that does allow waste and emissions of soot, which arises due to “incomplete combustion” in production processes of Petrochemicals as in case the crude oil refiners.
He added that besides having well structured internal Environment Compliance Audit, there other external agencies like Federal Ministry of Environment, Rivers State Ministry of Environment, National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency, NESREA, (an environmental agency of the Federal Government of Nigeria that were established by law in 2007 to “ensure a cleaner and healthier environment for Nigerians”.) and the Department of Petroleum Resources,DPR that works in conjunction with Emission Monitoring Control of the company.
He said the company is regularly audited by the agencies.
According to him, “there is Ambient Air Monitoring within and outside Indorama premises.We have won International Standards like five Star Safety Award by British Council, Sword of Honour by British Safety Council. The company has two plants which are the Petrochemical and Fertilizer plants.
It worthy of note that Indorama supplies more than 32 million farmers across the 36 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory,FCT.
Since 2017, the Federal Government stopped the importation of fertilizer due to adequate supply for local farmers and export by Indorama.