Note: This site looks much better on an standard compliant browser, however, the site content is accessible with any device connected to the Internet.
Go directly to the page content.
This web site was designed in accordance with
international norms on accesibility for persons with disabilities.
Last Update: July 16, 2008
Cambiar a Versión en Español
- Paper Pulp Mills - Uruguay
- Corporate Accountability and Human Rights
- Climate Change and Human Rights
Bridgestone – Firestone Argentina
Closed Preventively for Failure to Comply with Environmental and Safety Regulations
August 23, 2007 – Buenos Aires. Bridgestone Firestone Argentina , located in the Province of Buenos Aires, was forced to close its doors yesterday by order of the federal environment authority (the SAYDS), a preventive measure for failing to comply with environmental regulations, including the expiration of necessary permits for the operation of dangerous pressurized heating caldrons on the company site, placing workers and the general population at risk. The reason for closure also included observed deficiencies of depositories and handling of dangerous production materials as well deficient facilities for waste deposits.
Since 2005, 296 injuries and 2 deaths were reported in the Buenos Aires Province area, from explosion of similar pressurized water heating tanks, an alarming statistic cited by the environmental authority in its decision to suspend Bridgestone Firestone's operating permit.
Preventive closures are a discretionary power attributed to the SAYDS but hardly never before utilized in Argentina to preempt contamination and human health risks. The application of this preventive measure is part of a systemic re-haul of the country's federal Secretariat for Environment and Sustainable Development (SAYDS), and the prioritization of the environmental agenda by President Kirchner's administration (which included elevating the previous Environmental Secretariat which was under the Health Ministry, to Ministerial level operating directly under the President). Kirchner's move, which included bringing a renown environmental and human rights advocate to head the transformation, responds to evolving environmental social awareness and concerns over environmental risks and the health hazards they pose. This trend was catalyzed by a controversial pulp mill conflict on the border with Uruguay which drew hundreds of thousands of Argentines to what has become perhaps the world's largest social environmental movement.
Bridgestone Firestone Argentina is located in the Matanza Riachuelo River basin, a special focus-area of the Kirchner revamped environmental agenda, and one that Romina Picolotti, Argentina's Environment Secretary who assumed office last year, received on her list of priorities to address during Kirchner's last 18 months in office. A fifteen-year plan was designed under a federal emergency intervention law elaborated by the SAYDS, and in a collaborative effort with the three government jurisdictions (local, provincial and federal) in charge of the Riachuelo River Basin Authority, to oversee cleanup operations in the basin.
The 15-year plan includes strict controls over contaminating industries, in a region that has an estimated 3,000 companies, many of which, like Bridgestone Firestone, were rarely or never controlled for environmental compliance and enforcement of environmental laws, at any jurisdictional level.
More than 1,500 inspections have taken place in the Riachuelo alone, since July of last year, over 200 industries have had permits temporarily or permanently revoked for failure to comply with social and environmental normative regulations, 168 companies have had preventive measures applied, and 39 have been temporarily or permanently closed. Some of the companies affected by these measure include: Orvol (a large chemical company), Quilmes (the largest Argentine malt beer distributor), the Argentine subsidiary of the French Danone, Shell Argentina, and several pulp mill factories. Ten large petrochemical companies, including Dow Chemical, have also been obligated to relocate to a less environmentally sensitive area.
Bridgestone Firestone was given 10 days to present a study of the up and downstream water quality of its operations, clarify the methods it is using to treat water, as well as provide studies to determine the quality and production impacts on the subterranean aquifer. Firestone will also have to construct proper storage facilities for dangerous materials and waste before it is allowed to resume operations.
Florencia Roitstein, Sub Secretary of Environment, and in charge of the industrial relations for the SAYDS stated, “The government has decided that sustainable industrial development is a key element to the process of structural transformation which characterizes economic development and poverty reduction. Focusing on policy and practical measures we are currently addressing the areas of control on the one hand, and in helping create an environment which provides sufficient rewards to enterprises addressing the social and environmental impact of their industrial production process, on the other. Since we began this effort just over a year ago, more than 150 enterprises were invited to join our challenge and many of these are in a process of readjusting their industrial processes to international best available technologies (BATs)”.
More Information
For more information please contact:
Cel: 54 116 182 3172
