U.S.-based Blacksmith Institute, an independent environmental group, in partnership with Green Cross Switzerland, have announced their second annual Top Ten list of the world's most severely polluted places. The sites lie in seven countries and affect the health of more than 12 million people.

The Top Ten list is part of a more comprehensive group of polluted locations around the globe, the “Dirty 30," which have been included in Blacksmith Institute's World's Worst Polluted Places 2007. The majority of the Dirty 30 sites lie in Asia, with China, India, and Russia having the greatest number. Since 1999, the Institute has built up a database of over 400 polluted sites.

Two of the Top Ten sites are in India. In Vapi, more than fifty industrial estates pollute the local soils and groundwater with pesticides, PCBs, chromium, mercury (96 times higher than WHO standards), lead, and cadmium. In the other site, Sukinda, twelve chromite ore mines operate without environmental controls, leaching hexavalent chromium into drinking water supplies.

The Blacksmith Institute works around the globe to identify dangerously polluted sites and initiate their clean up. Collaboration with Green Cross began in 2006.

Contact: Blacksmith Institute, USA, Australia and India, info@blacksmithinstitute.org, http://www.blacksmithinstitute.org/.

Source: Blacksmith Institute, 12 Sep 2007

Tags: information and communication, water quality