Politician Otmar Oduber says that the concern is extremely high regarding the situation at Parkietenbos since a letter was leaked. The Minister of Environment in this case did not notify the neighborhood or the resident committee at Simon Antonio and Parkietenbos to decide to go back to using an open air burner. This is simply when you are burning dead animals, medical waste, and sludge together with wood. This dries out the materials a bit but it doesn’t work, according to Oduber, and which was a huge disgrace for this country which ended this process in 2018 as well.
The letter Oduber is referring to is the one sent by DOW to Minister of Environment Ursell Arends, requesting permission to use at least two open air burners. The minister approved, subject to certain conditions, and for a maximum of 8 months while seeking another solution.
“Now the minister is deciding to go back in this direction. This is a public outcry; it’s unacceptable to return to that situation there.” Oduber emphasizes that the Minister herself states in her letter that it’s not within the framework of environmental management for Aruba. She also states in the letter that it’s not the most desirable system but they’re going back to this system simply because there wasn’t the vision and courage to make decisions to obtain permits in time.
They were using an incinerator that works using a system that precisely controls all the air going up, according to all international standards, and was also put in public tender. But they “overburned” the incinerator at that time, burning more than it could handle – without seeing the smoke, disaster, or danger this poses to hygiene – they needed to search for more but never did, and there’s no decision from the government’s side on this either.
“DOW needs to be honest with the Aruban community. I was the Minister of DOW and I let reports be made at that time. After paying a company in Aruba 1.7 million florins per year for four years to burn this sludge, it turned out through reports that at that time 90% was burned – only 10% was burned sludge – and 90% came out as it was, and it would boil over at that time on the dump, creating a huge unhygienic aspect for our community. I don’t understand how it’s possible to go back to the same system. It costs 100 odd thousand florins again, more than 1.2 million florins per year to process this waste in Aruba which simply didn’t work.”
