In the first ever case of “reverse dumping”, 290 metric tons of hazardous mercury wastes from a thermometer factory in India are being sent back to the United States.
The largest hazardous waste transfer from India marks the end of a long struggle by local people and environmental activists led by Greenpeace India.
They had alleged that mercury vapors released from the factory owned by Hindustan Lever, a subsidiary of Unilever, ruined the health of the workers and community and caused lasting damage to the environment during its 18 years of operation.
The consignment, including glass culets, finished and semi-finished products and sludge. The shipment is heading to the hazardous waste recycling firm, Bethlehem Apparatus, a Hellertown, PA, mercury recycling facility. Bethlehem Apparatus says it is the largest commercial mercury recycling in the world.
The controversial thermometer factory was transplanted in India in 1983 after it was shut down in Watertown, NY.
The factory imported all its mercury, primarily from the United States, and finished thermometers were exported to back to the us for distribution to markets abroad.
Environmental groups had alleged that the factory had been responsible for considerable mercury contamination over the last 18 years.
Contamination levels outside the factory were measured at 600-800 times permissible limits but the company had been denying this figure.
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