Namibia Dairies says limited environmental impact despite 6 000 litre oil-leakage

WINDHOEK, FEB 6 – A technical failure at Namibia Dairies’ Avis plant resulted in the release of approximately 6 000 litres of heavy fuel oil into the Windhoek sewerage system on February 3, according to a press release from O&L.

The majority of the spillage was however contained on-site with swift response to the incident which was led by Namibia Dairies with support of relevant stakeholders.

However, due to concern about the potential impacts of the oil to the ecosystem and water reclamation systems, Namibia Dairies sought technical assistance from the City of Windhoek (CoW) in the assessing and minimizing impacts, as well as supporting the further response.

A joint Namibia Dairies / City of Windhoek Response team was subsequently formed, with the objective of strengthening efforts in containing and cleaning up the oil spillage, as well as to provide support to assessing the situation and developing an action plan for a phased response and rehabilitation initiative.

The team is currently spending time in the affected area in order to determine the exact extent of the impact as this will have a direct correlation on the further response and rehabilitation actions required.

Based on the team’s observation, there is limited immediate environmental impact on the receiving environment in close proximity to the plant. However, the full extent of the downstream impact is currently being monitored and a continuous status update will be formulated as information is acquired.

“All efforts are currently being undertaken to ensure that all disrupted activities can resume as soon as reasonably possible in order to minimize the cumulative impact of the event. ND is taking every effort within its control to ensure that any and all environmental contamination is dealt with in a responsible manner. All learnings from the incident will also be used to empower industry and other stakeholders to be able to respond to such unfortunate events, should it ever occur again in the future,” read a statement from Namibia Dairies. – NDN Staffer