Portugal – Quercus elects pollution of the river Tagus as the worst environmental facto 2015 – The Ribatejo | online regional newspaper

The list was announced Monday in a statement with Quercus to expect, environmental outlook for 2016 that municipalities opt more for non-chemical methods, alternative herbicides to combat weeds and that the state invest in education and environmental awareness for protected areas.

The association warns of the “recurrent episodes of pollution” in the Tagus River, which cause them to “present year after year, more degraded and threatened” and was “detected barriers to migration” of fish.

The list of the worst environmental facts encompasses waste recycling targets, the increase of eucalyptus “at the expense mainly of conversion-brave pine” , fraud in greenhouse gas emissions in diesel vehicles of the Volkswagen Group, forest fires, the lack of food for scavenger birds, the wind farm in Torre de Moncorvo, designed for a buffer zone, and illegal poisoning of birds in danger of extinction, such as the black vulture and the Egyptian Vulture.

The organization also considers as negative in 2015, the extraordinary system of regulation of establishments activity and unlicensed farms “in general highly polluting companies or lax enforcement of environmental standards “, and domestic and agricultural use, in Portugal, of glyphosate, a herbicide which can cause cancer.

For the environmental association, the targets set for recycling urban waste “are absurd”, since, pointed, inner regions of the are required to recycle 80% of waste in 2020, while the cities of Lisbon and Porto 42% and 35%.

In the list of best environmental facts 2015 include the recovery in Portugal, populations of animals that have been extinct, such as the imperial eagle Iberian and the Iberian lynx, the birth, in the Ribatejo region, of various civic movements in particular in defense of Almonda river, legislation on fertilizers produced from biodegradable waste, the climate agreement in Paris and the creation of canine teams GNR for detection of poisons in protected areas such as the Guadiana Valley and the International Tagus.

In 2016, the Quercus expects the Portuguese government “have a voice” from the Spanish government for the nuclear power plant Almaraz “definitely terminate its activity” and electronic guides waste monitoring are created, to “assist in the supervision and the proper recording of management operations” of waste produced.