An international body for the protection of wetlands is investigating acute toxic pollution and a PNG government approved plan for a $15.6 billion mining project at Lake Kutubu — a world listed site.

The Ramsar Secretariat, responsible for the Ramsar Convention on internationally significant wetlands, will question the PNG Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) over an unreported toxic pollution event in 2007 and a projected $15.6 billion PNG LNG mining project at the world recognised lake.

“The Secretariat did not hear about the event (pollution) in 2007 until [Reportage] brought it to our attention,” Lewellyn Young, senior regional advisor for Asia/Oceania of the Ramsar Convention Secretariat, told Reportage. “If there has been an incident, then the next step is for us to get assistance for that site.”

The Ramsar Secretariat will also ask questions about the PNG Government’s decision to sign off on the multi- billion dollar Oil Search-ExxonMobil-Santos gas project.

Evidence of acute toxic pollution at Lake Kutubu in June and July 2007 was reported in the media by the Sydney-based Sun Herald in September. Kutubu residents made statements at the time of the pollution incident that the water changed colour and large numbers of fish floated on the surface of the lake.

Many also said they had suffered severe vomiting, diarrhoea and skin and eye irritation — including skin-sores — after swimming in the water or eating fish and drinking from the lake.

One local girl is reported to have died two days after eating fish from the lake.

As a signatory to the Ramsar Convention since 1998, the PNG Government is directly responsible for maintaining the ecological health of Lake Kutubu.

Under the Convention, it is obliged to report to the Secretariat at the earliest possible time any change or threat of change to the ecological character of its wetland.

Sites where changes in ecological character have occurred, are occurring, or are likely to occur, are also to be placed on the Secretariat’s Montreux Record for closer monitoring.

Reportage research shows there are discrepancies in the accounts by the DEC and the Australian mining company Oil Search Ltd – who was drilling the site at the time – about when they first became aware of the incident, the nature of investigations and the likely cause of the pollution.

In a statement issued by its executive director Peter Botten, Oil Search Ltd said it reported the incident immediately to the PNG Department of Environment and Conservation (DEC) on May 23 2007, followed by a detailed incident report that was delivered on June 21.

Read the rest in Reportage Enviro, a branch of the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism magazine, Reportage.