resurfaces

Pollution row resurfaces

CONTROVERSY about pollution from the Ok Tedi mine in the Papua New Guinea highlands has surfaced again.

The Wilderness Society’s Dr Kevin Vang said at a recent world conser vation union meeting in Perth that waste debouching from the Fly River into the Gulf of Papua could be more harmful than previously thought. He said it was possible to measure the impact of the toxic copper waste on the Great Barrier Reef off Queensland and the Torres Strait islands.

But the co-ordinator of the Austra lian Government’s Torres Strait Base Line Study, Dr David Lawrence, has disputed this, saying there was insuf ficient scientific information and in tensive sampling to back up Vang’s assertions.

Estimates were that the Ok Tedi mine would add another 42 million tonnes annually during its peak pro duction, and only two per cent might enter the Torres Strait area. □