Residents Complain of Gas Odour from Hamriya

Residents of Mushairif and Al Jarf areas in Ajman, Al Salama area in Umm Al Quwain and Al Hamriya area in Sharjah said the gas odour persists throughout the day. The smell gets stronger at night, they added.

Tawfeeq Al Majid, resident of Al Hamriya, said the smell, which had increased considerably over the past two days, was irritating the residents and causing the people to worry about the health of their children.

Saif bu Hailul from Al Salama said the gas smell was harming the people of the area and urged the authorities to ensure protection of public health and environment by initiating action to curb the smell.

Rashid Al Shamsi, director of Al Hamriya Municipality, said the Environment Section began investigations after a large number of people complained.

“It’s important to follow up the issue to protect the environment and public health in these areas and ensuring proper infrastructure before building residential cities in Sharjah and Ajman,” pointed out.

According to Ajman Civil Defence Director-General, Colonel Salih Al Matroushi, more than 1,000 petrochemical factories based in the Al Hamriya Free Zone were to blame for the gas smell. There are nearly 400,000 factories in the free zone.

Al Matroushi said ‘most’ of the petrol refineries lacked filters, which results in gases polluting the air.

The Civil Defence and municipalities require filters be installed in all factories in the free zone and other industrial areas. Defaulters face penalties of up to Dh100,000 and closure, under the municipality’s administrative laws.

Al Matroushi said the Civil Defence air pollution detector had not registered any gases yet.

Dr Rashed Al Alleem, director-general of the free zone, however, said no complaints had been received from residents and all factories were abiding by the environment protection regulations and using advanced methods to prevent gas emissions that could affect the public health.

“Only one factory was shut down recently for violating environment protection regulations by allowing emission of gases into the air,” he said.

Alleem said the Ajman Civil Defence should measure the pollution in the air before making any comment.

He suggested that the municipalities in the three emirates, the residents’ representatives, the Civil Defence and Al Hamriya Free Zone should set up a committee to trace the source of the gas smell and take action to rectify the situation.

The Sharjah environment company Bee’ah, under an agreement signed in March last year, is the regulatory and monitoring partner of the free zone.

A representative of the company, who was not authorised to speak to the media, described the company’s role as environmental consultants tasked with risk assessments and environmental impact studies, and said there was no date by which it would begin implementing penalties. The representative said Bee’ah had not been contacted by the municipality to carry out an investigation.

The Director-General of Ajman Police, Brigadier Ali Alwan, warned that stiff penalties have been spelt out under the Environment Protection and Conservation Law, apart from the municipality’s discretionary powers to punish defaulters.

Those found polluting the environment with hazardous materials, such as nuclear waste, risk death sentence and fines ranging from Dh1 million to Dh10 million.

The police deal with environment-related offence as any other crimes and violators and defaulters are arrested and referred to public prosecution.


afkarali@khaleejtimes.com