Hermosa, Bataan—Mayor Jopet Inton has padlocked the sanitary landfill facility here being operated by a private company under the Public Private Partnership scheme for alleged violation of environmental laws.
The mayor personally served the stoppage order to Econest Waste Management Corp., operator of the Hermosa sanitary landfill facility in Barangay Mambog.
“This stoppage of operation order is temporary in nature in view of the investigation being conducted by Department of Environment and Natural Resources-Environmental Management Bureau to Econest for their violations,” Inton said.
He said the municipal government also issued a notice of violation to the company last Jan. 28. DENR-EMB issued its notice on Feb. 13.
“Econest is operating the Hermosa sanitary landfill under PPP with the municipal government. We have the right to stop whatever operation that is harmful to the environment for the welfare of the people.
While we are waiting for the technical conference of the DENR-EMB and we are conducting other investigation on their violations, we are stopping their operation for the meantime,” he said.
Inton said the sanitary landfill operator is continuously polluting the environment.
Econest, however, claimed it has not committed violations of the environmental law.
In the press conference called by Econest a day before the stoppage order, Atty. Beulah Coeli Fiel, president of Econest, said they were surprised that the NOV of EMB was just a repetition of that listed in the Hermosa LGU show cause order they had answered, with a copy furnished to the EMB.
“On the issue that Econest does not have a discharge permit and not registered as hazardous waste generator, we never intentionally discharged wastewater. We are currently applying for a discharge permit after we have passed laboratory testing,” she said.
Fiel said the LGU based its finding on “unavoidably and unintentional overflow of the leachate.”
On the issue that the earthen lagoon and temporary cell for compostable waste does not have lining, thus allowing the leachate to seep into the soil, Fiel said the right handling of biodegradable waste, aside from having it separate from non-biodegradable waste, was intended to ripen it to be turned into fertilizer.
She said that EMB inspected the facility in December 2019 and again on January 30, 2020 and issued no negative findings.
She said they surmise that the move by the mayor is a knee-jerk reaction to the press conference they called where they aired their side to media.
Fiel said they are “crying harassment and oppression,” adding they will divulge “the real truth” behind the attacks in due time.