DECONTAMINATION PROCESSES

Gregorio Comar

From the Merli Law to the “Tubone”

On 10 May 1976, the so-called Merli Law [1], concerning water protection, came into force. For the first time in Italy, industrial and civil discharges into sewers, watercourses, and soil were regulated. While the Regions were assigned a planning role through the drafting of Regional Water Remediation Plans, the Provinces were tasked with surveying all discharges and ensuring compliance with the law by private individuals and companies. Moreover, Article 15 of the new law required companies discharging wastewater to request authorization from the Province. However, the same article also specified that if the authority failed to respond within a maximum of six months, the so-called silence-consent clause would apply, granting automatic authorization.

On 10 August, in compliance with this law, SNIA submitted its request for authorization [2] to discharge at three points—two in the Taglio River and one in the Banduzzi Canal. Having received no response within the following six months, the company considered the silence-consent clause applicable.

In November 1977 [3], SNIA informed the Province of modifications to certain plants, stating that these were carried out in implementation of the Merli Law. However, these changes did not lead to any improvement in terms of water contamination, but merely modernized facilities that were no longer efficient from a production standpoint. Indeed, despite repeatedly affirming its commitment to combating pollution, the company explicitly stated that, following the planned works, “the existing situation of water discharges […] will not undergo any change in terms of location, volume, or quality of effluents” [4], thus demonstrating concern only for the plant’s productivity.

In 1980, what had by then become Chimica del Friuli began work to adapt its plants to the Merli Law, with a deadline set for 1 September of the following year. However, the company requested a one-year extension, citing “both technical and financial reasons” [5].

On 13 April 1984, the company submitted to the Mayor of Torviscosa a modification project [6] of its industrial plan entitled “Proposals for a development and investment plan – period 1983–1988” [7], drafted only a year and a half earlier. Behind this “modification”—a euphemistic term for abandoning compliance with environmental regulations introduced in 1976—were the allegedly “unrealistic” timelines [8] of the projects. The complete elimination of environmental programs was downplayed by the vague commitment to propose “alternative solutions as soon as the time is right” [9]. Thus, Chimica del Friuli officially acknowledged the inadequacy of its discharges with respect to legal standards and stated that it had no intention of taking action to meet regulatory limits—eight years after the Merli Law had come into force.

Since the pollution problem persisted, in 1987 the Region established a new body to treat wastewater from the cellulose production cycle before its discharge into the lagoon: the Lower Friuli Water Treatment Consortium, later renamed the Lagoon Treatment Consortium.

The initial project envisaged discharging treated liquids six kilometers offshore from the island of Sant’Andrea through a submarine pipe with a diameter of 1.2 meters. For this reason, the entire system would be informally known as the “Tubone” (big pipe).

As construction progressed, however, costs escalated:

they increased both due to price revision mechanisms and through technical redesign of the project. The original funding of 66 billion lire, allocated in 1986 from FIO funds, rose to 76 billion with the redesign of certain main collector routes; to 115 billion in 1990 for the construction of a thermal destruction plant […]. The third revision raised the cost to 137 billion, due to upgrading the treatment plant to three lines and installing a remote-control system. Shortly thereafter (in 1991), the figure rose to 146 billion due to the need for a thickening and mechanical dewatering tank. Finally, in 1992, the last increase brought the total to 156 billion [10].

The main problem was that the plant, although built according to the company’s needs, proved undersized and inadequate: the company continued to discharge 10 million cubic meters of wastewater per year into local watercourses, as the treatment plant was not authorized to process mercury-containing waste, and even if it had been, it would not have been able to handle such a heavy load, considering that other discharges already conveyed to the plant amounted to 6 million tons [11].

The result was that, despite more than 150 billion lire spent on the Tubone, the company continued to discharge mercury-containing wastewater directly into water bodies without any treatment.

At the same time, paradoxically, the plant was underutilized: due to the closure in 1991 of part of Caffaro’s production processes—particularly cellulose—the treatment plant processed far less wastewater than required for efficient operation, generating an annual deficit of around three billion lire [12].

In an attempt to address this issue, it was decided to connect the sewage systems of several municipalities in Lower Friuli, so as to use the plant at full capacity. In 1995 Carlino and Marano were connected, followed in subsequent years by Cervignano, Muzzana, San Giorgio di Nogaro, and Torviscosa. In practice, however, this decision shifted the burden of the failed project—originally designed to treat industrial discharges—onto taxpayers. In fact, every household was required to connect to the Tubone, channeling all sewage into it, with significant costs for the affected families.

Despite this measure, the Tubone continued to rely on constant regional funding, with the Region covering the Consortium’s deficits until 1997. In the following years, in order to balance the accounts, the Consortium’s management decided to accept waste from outside the region.

In 1999, despite initial denials by Consortium officials, a report by Mareno Settimo, then a municipal councillor in Torviscosa, revealed that the Tubone had begun to treat waste from southern Italy, particularly from the chemical plant in Manfredonia [13]. This raised serious questions about the legality of such transfers and the suitability of the Consortium’s facilities for their treatment.

The Consortium’s management attempted to justify its actions by citing economic necessities related to plant operations, but the issue became so serious that in April 1999 the Carabinieri’s Environmental Protection Unit (NOE) intervened and seized several tanker trucks containing wastewater ready for disposal in San Giorgio di Nogaro.

The investigations resulted in formal charges against three individuals, including Gianfranco Turchetti, president of the Consortium, accused of waste disposal without authorization or under an unlawful authorization [14].

In February 2003, two sections of the Tubone—the sludge drying plant and the physico-chemical treatment facility—were seized. It was alleged that these plants had operated, until then, one under an unlawful provincial authorization and the other without an Environmental Impact Assessment [15].

On 13 December 2010, Gianfranco Turchetti, president of the Consortium, along with other defendants, was found guilty of illegal waste trafficking and aggravated environmental damage to the “territorial sea, the seabed and subsoil […] surrounding the offshore discharge of the Consortium’s facilities” [16], having polluted “the sediments with toxic and hazardous bioaccumulative substances and compromised the marine ecosystem” [17].

1. [FG 1976] Legge 10 maggio 1976 n. 319, Norme per la tutela delle acque dall’inquinamento, in Gazzetta ufficiale della Repubblica italiana del 29 maggio 1976.
2. [FA 1976_1] ARCHIVIO STORICO DEL COMUNE DI TORVISCOSA, Controllo ambientale, Tutela delle acque, b. 5, fasc. 6, Snia Viscosa: richiesta di proroga all’attuazione del programma di adeguamento alla tab. C degli scarichi industriali.
3. Ibidem.
4. Ibidem.
5. Ibidem.
6. [FA 1984_1] ARCHIVIO STORICO DEL COMUNE DI TORVISCOSA, Controllo ambientale, Industria Chimica del Friuli, b. 10, fasc. 2, Crisi occupazionale – relazione Waste management inc.” (1984 – 1993), Comunicazione amministratore delegato.
7. Ibidem.
8. Ibidem.
9. Ibidem.
10. [FS 19940217] Il tubone, miliardi a mare, «Messaggero Veneto», 17 febbraio 1994.
11. [FS 19970207_1] Ma il tubone non ce la fa, «Il gazzettino», 7 febbraio 1997 e [FS 19970209] La battaglia del mercurio: riecco il Comitato di difesa, «Messaggero Veneto», 9 febbraio 1997.
12. [FS 19940217] Il tubone, miliardi a mare, «Messaggero Veneto», 17 febbraio 1994.
13. [FS 19991022] La fogna più amata dagli italiani, «Il gazzettino», 22 ottobre 1999.
14. [FS 20021129] Consorzio Laguna: tre avvisi di garanzia, «Messaggero Veneto» 29 novembre 2002. Successivamente verrà contestato anche il reato di traffico illecito di rifiuti.
15. [FS 20030215_1] Tubone, sequestro blocca due impianti, «Il gazzettino», 15 febbraio 2003.
16. Sentenza numero 1624 del 2010.
17. Ibidem.