To provide support to authorities to undertake sustainable and environment friendly measures in tackling pyralene issue in “Incel” business zone in Banja Luka, UNDP within the recently launched the “Environmentally Sound Management of Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) in Industrial and Hazardous Waste Sectors” Project has engaged international experts from Tauw company from the Netherlands. Tauw is an international consulting company with 90 years of experience in environmental protection including the sustainable remediation, risk assessments, soil protection, site development, etc. Tauw advises governmental organization and larger industrial client in various parts of the world to solve problems related to persistent organic pollutants. The consultant was tasked to assess the environmental and health risks of pollution on the industrial location of Incel and to propose the next steps.

In August 2019, the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Civil Engineering and Ecology of Republika Srpska, as one of the Project Board members, nominated Incel as priority location in Republika Srpska for solving the issue of contaminated soil. At that point, the Ministry nominated the Operative Team composed of representatives of relevant institutions from Republika Srpska and the City of Banja Luka to provide all available data, documentation and information to the international expert Boudewijn Fokke from Tauw engaged by UNDP. Mr. Fokke has over 35 years of experience in the soil remediation field. He worked in 29 countries such as Netherlands, Italy, Poland, Russia, Turkey, China, Serbia and others.

During August, Mr Fokke conducted a field visit to Banja Luka. During this visit, he held a series of meetings with members of the Operative team, visited the location of Incel, inspected locations of sampling campaigns and collected documentation.

Preliminary site assessment was conducted in period from August to November 2019. The aim was to develop an Initial Conceptual Site Model based on which a preliminary assessment of human health and ecosystem risks, as well as possibility and modalities for migration of pollutants through soil and groundwaters were conducted.

On 2 December 2019, Mr Fokke presented the findings. He stated that risks for human health and ecosystem are manageable and that the situation is not alarming. After the presentation, the representatives of City Inspectorate of Banja Luka revealed that in parallel to the work of Mr. Fokke, they ordered additional sampling and analyses of 140 samples at the location. Nobody (neither representatives from the Ministry of Spatial Planning, Civil Engineering and Ecology of RS nor UNDP) was aware or informed of these additional activities.

To make sure that all relevant data, including these newly collected data obtained by additional soil sampling and analyses were taken into consideration and included in the Conceptual model, it was agreed to organize a meeting among the consultant, representatives of the City inspectorate, city authorities, the Ministry, Institute for Ecology and Protection and UNDP in the upcoming days.

The aim of the meeting is to discuss the main findings of the report prepared by the Consultant and to get the insight in the recent sampling campaign and try to agree upon usage of all relevant results in the next phases of the project and possibilities for future cooperation and acting together in finding the best solution to the problem.