Keys to the tide of plastic pellets in Galicia: what they are, why was the reaction so late and who is responsible for cleaning them up?
– Xunta de Galicia rectifies and raises the alert level to receive support from the Government in the removal of the pellet tide
A tide of plastic pellets has been reaching the Galician coast since mid-December, after a ship, the Toconao, lost part of its cargo off the coast of northern Portugal. The small balls have been found over the days in an increasingly larger territory and have already reached Asturias, Cantabria and Euskadi. It all started a month ago, but the Xunta’s contingency plan for cases of maritime pollution was not activated until January 5. The reason given by the Galician president, Alfonso Rueda, is that he did not have official communication until two days before. The conversations between administrations disprove it: the Galician government knew about it since the first waste was found, on December 13. Four days after activating the plan, Rueda has rectified and has finally raised the emergency level in order to receive government aid. Before Galicia, Asturias had already done so.
During those first weeks without the autonomic contingency plan activated, the cleaning tasks were assumed alone by the successive municipalities affected. Faced with the trail of finds along the Galician coast, an incipient movement of volunteers began to move to some beaches for the laborious task of removing tiny scattered balls. The Galician Government assured that the material was not „toxic or hazardous“ based on a one-page report signed by a company expert. A second, more detailed study does warn that it should be treated with care: „Do not inhale, avoid contact with skin, eyes and clothing“. The Galician government now says it has mobilized 200 troops. And, after resisting for four days, it has raised the emergency to level two and, after an exchange of statements on who should determine how much resources should be allocated, has demanded resources from the central government. The invoice, the Xunta insists, will be passed on to the shipowner, a Bermuda-based company. These are the keys to the pollution episode.
What are pellets?
These are balls of a few millimeters that are used as raw material to manufacture different plastic products. They are also called nurdles or mermaid tears. They are very light and are easily dispersed in the sand, making them difficult to remove. Biologists and ecologists warn of the risk to marine organisms, which ingest these elements because they mistake them for food. They accumulate in the digestive system and can cause infections or starvation, according to Liliana Solís, a biologist at the Cofradía de Pescadores de Noia. The Xunta, on the other hand, maintains that they are not „toxic or dangerous“. The document on which the Xunta has relied to deny the danger of plastics does not bear the signature of any scientific institute, as elDiario.es has learned, and is signed by an expert technician in plastics recycling who works for the company Valtalia.
The company whose name appears on the bags is Bedeko Europe. The company, based in Poland, is engaged in the manufacture of such materials. It does not clarify the composition of the pellets that are appearing on the beaches and limits itself to pointing out that they are not toxic and that one of the uses is to manufacture „products that come into contact with food“. They disassociate themselves from any responsibility in the contamination episode in Galicia because, they claim, the owners of the goods are not them, but an Indian manufacturer. The responsibility for the fall of the containers into the sea is attributed to the shipping company Maersk, which, in turn, assures that none of the six lost containers, en route between Algeciras and Rotterdam, contained substances classified as hazardous and that they are investigating the reason why the ship lost part of its cargo.
December 8: the origin of everything
On December 8, 2023, the Liberian-flagged vessel Toconao was sailing off the coast of northern Portugal, 80 kilometers off Viana do Castelo. It lost six of the cargo containers it was loaded with. One of them was filled with sacks of plastic pellets. The central government has indicated that the estimates given by the shipowning companies’ lawyer are that it was carrying 1,000 bags of pellets – some 28 tons of material – and that they do not know whether the container has sunk or not. Regarding the contents of the other containers, the Minister of Transportation, Óscar Puentes, indicated that there were materials such as tires, metals and tomato paste. The company that owns the vessel is Polar 3 Ltd, based in Bermuda, a tax haven, although it offers as its address that of another company, Columbia Shipmanagement Ltd, based in Cyprus and owned by German businessman Heinrich Schoeller.
First findings
The first report is from December 13, when a private individual found pellets on a beach in Ribeira (A Coruña). There were whole bags as well as loose balls. In the following days they were found on more beaches towards the interior of the Muros e Noia estuary, in the southern part, specifically in points of the municipality of Porto do Son. On January 3rd they appear in Muros, in the north of the estuary. And in the following days they are located in other points all over Galicia: in the Costa da Morte, A Coruña and the Mariña de Lugo. On Monday, January 8, they were also found in Asturias and the following day some were located in Cantabria and Euskadi. The Noia Limpa association has been collecting on a map all the points where pellets have been reported to have appeared in Galicia.
Who is cleaning the coast?
The administration that reacted first to the appearance of these plastics on the coast was the local one. The municipalities to which the affected stretches of coastline belong sent their emergency and clean-up teams, despite their limited capacity in some cases, as soon as they were informed that they had reached the beaches. The mayoress of Muros, María Lago, indicated on the 4th that she only had two workers available to collect these tiny balls in the sandy areas. The cleaning of beaches is generally the responsibility of the municipalities. The The National Marine Pollution Response System establishes a phased activation that allows the allocation of resources from other administrations to these tasks depending on the severity or extent of the episode. If the resources of the municipalities are not sufficient or if several municipalities are affected, the plan is to activate the next level, level 1, in which the resources of the autonomous community are already involved. The Xunta took this decision, to activate the level 1 emergency, on January 5, when the presence of plastics in at least two municipalities had been known for weeks. Four days later, despite the initial rejection, it agreed to raise the level to 2, which allows it to request resources from the ministries.
On the weekend of January 6 and 7, groups of volunteers started going to the beaches to remove the pellets on their own. Some environmental associations have begun to give recommendations for the task and to coordinate those who approach the coast. Greenpeace warns in its Decalogue that other elements on the beach, such as shells or seaweed, should not be extracted and that the accumulated material should not be deposited in the usual containers because it is industrial waste.
Is this the first time something like this has happened?
Two and a half years ago an oil spill hit the Sri Lankan coast after the X-Press Pearl vessel caught fire and sank. In this case, the vessel was also loaded with chemicals, including nitric acid, as well as plastic pellets that covered part of the country’s coastline. Since 2012, around a dozen incidents have been recorded involving the loss of ship-bound pellet cargoes at points in the North Sea, South Africa or Hong Kong.
Maersk lost 46 containers off the coast of Denmark at the end of December 2023 in the middle of storm Pia, Bedeko recalls. There were no granulates in these, but tires and shoes arrived on the coasts.
Cross accusations
The pollution episode has led to criticism of the Xunta, which has reacted by attributing responsibility for who should respond to municipalities and the central government. The Consellería do Mar accuses the State Executive of having withheld information and the president of the Xunta, Alfonso Rueda, said that the first official communication is from January 3. However, the conversations between administrations refute this statement and show that the Xunta was aware of what was happening 21 days before what it says.
The central government has reviewed the dates: the discovery on December 13 on a beach in Ribeira was reported to 112, a service managed by the Xunta. The 112 passes the warning to Salvamento Marítimo. On December 20, he adds, the Fisterra Maritime Rescue Center reports that its investigation points to a loss of cargo from the vessel Toconao. This information is also transferred to the deputy director of the Gardacostas service, which depends on the Consellería do Mar. That same day, the shipping company’s lawyer contacted Salvamento and confirmed that on December 8, six containers from that vessel fell into the sea. In its account of communications, the Government adds that on December 26, Civil Protection of the Government Delegation received information that there are pellets in the natural park of Corrubedo – the responsibility of the Department of the Environment – and contacted the person in charge of the park to give him the contact of the shipping company – which should assume the cost of the cleanup, although the mess of the Prestige proved that this is not always an easy task. The following day, personnel from the Department of the Environment requested more information from the Civil Protection Department.
What does the National Response System say about emergency phases?
It distinguishes between two areas: the marine area – with exclusive competences of the State, through the Ministry of Transport – and the coast, where there is activation by levels. There is a first emergency phase, which is 0, for pollution episodes „of small magnitude and danger“. Applies when the effects are limited to a local entity. That is, in this case, when only one municipality is affected.
Situation 1 -the one initially declared by the Xunta- implies a medium magnitude, in which there are circumstances such as that the means of phase 0 are not sufficient or that the contamination affects several neighboring municipalities. In this case, the autonomous community must come into play. If necessary, the National Maritime Plan could be activated. The central government has not done so because „it is activated when an emergency is detected at sea and action can be taken against it“, but in the inspections carried out by sea and air „no material was discovered, as the plastic is almost undetectable in the high seas“.
The following is situation 2, which the Xunta has just activated this Tuesday despite its initial rejection. It occurs if the means already mobilized are not sufficient or if the area is particularly vulnerable. When this level is reached, the Royal Decree on the response system in case of marine pollution indicates that means can be requested from the Ministry of Public Works -now called Transport- and from the Ministry of the Environment -in this case, the Ministry of Ecological Transition-. But the first community to activate it before Galicia has been Asturias, which in recent days has begun to see these small plastics on its beaches. In Galicia, the transition from one level to another opened another confrontation with the central government: the community refused at first to specify what resources it was asking for, while the Ministry of Ecological Transition replied that it was up to them to communicate what their needs were.
Finally, there is situation 3, for episodes of „great magnitude or danger“, which is used when several autonomous communities are affected, when there may be an impact on neighboring states or when there is a danger to the safety of people and property and the Ministry of the Interior declares the emergency of national interest.
