In its search for the causes of the massive fish kill in the Oder, Greenpeace sees responsibility for the Polish mining industry. The organization reports that high levels of salt have been discovered in the wastewater from several mines, emphasizing: "This environmental disaster was avoidable."
Greenpeace blames salt discharges from the Polish mining industry for the mass deaths of fish in the Oder in the summer. According to the environmental organization, this is indicated by the results of water and soil samples that Greenpeace activists took at the end of August between Schwedt in Brandenburg and the Polish-Czech border along a river length of about 550 kilometers. The environmentalists drew a total of seventeen samples. Heavy metal levels were increased in four river sediment samples.
According to the report, the highest salt values were found in a retention basin belonging to the mining company KGHM in Gmina Polkowice in the Lower Silesian Voivodeship. The salt content there was 40 times higher than the values recommended for fresh water. Also noticeable were high salt levels upstream on the Gliwice Canal, which Greenpeace says other mines use to discharge their wastewater into the Oder.
In August there had been a massive fish kill in the Oder, which gradually spread to the mouth of the river in the Szczecin Lagoon. Among other things, experts blamed a high salt content for this, which could have favored the appearance of a species of algae that is poisonous to fish and was not of natural origin. Greenpeace also assumes that the salty water favors toxic algae species such as Prymnesium parvum, which appears to have caused the fish to die when the water temperatures are high. The toxin of the alga has "fatal consequences for fish or mussels that come into contact with it and are already damaged by heavy metals".
"This environmental catastrophe was avoidable," said Greenpeace spokeswoman Nina Noelle. The organization calls on the Polish and German governments "to renaturate the river in the future, to monitor it around the clock and to ban the discharge of harmful substances such as salts and heavy metals."
The WWF Germany is also pushing for an immediate stop to the expansion work on the Oder. Instead of an expansion, extensive measures are required to revitalize the river, for example the reconnection of tributaries, the environmental protection organization in Berlin explained. "We experienced a man-made disaster on the Oder that massively damaged the river ecosystem," warned WWF water expert Tobias Schäfer. With further channelization "the next catastrophe is programmed". In Poland, the government website will present its report on the death of fish in the Oder on Thursday. The German report is to be published on Friday.
