Woolrec
Woolrec is a former recycling company in Central Hesse , Germany. It triggered a nationwide environmental scandal. According to its own information, the company should process carcinogenic mineral fibers from old insulation material in Woolit , a harmless additive for the brick industry. It later emerged that the alleged production processes were bogus and that the hazardous waste had been passed on to the brick and tile industry unchanged.
Woolrec scandal
Woolrec in 2002 in Central Hesse Tiefenbach with funding from the Federal Ministry of the Environment established in the amount of 550,000 euros. Local residents had concerns from the start and protested regularly against the company. The woolite produced during production by mixing clay and molasses was intended to improve the strength of bricks . As it turned out later, the Woolit presented to the authorities at the start of production was not created in the alleged production processes, rather the hazardous waste was pulled through a commercially available meat grinder and then mixed with gelatine from the supermarket.
In February 2012, the Hessischer Rundfunk reported that the Fresenius Institute classified a submitted sample of Woolit as carcinogenic. The product was u. a. a brick factory in North Rhine-Westphalia Olfen delivered where also carcinogenic substances were detected, followed by production in the local operation is stopped immediately. The regional council of Gießen commissioned an expert from Justus Liebig University Gießen , who is himself employed at Woolrec, to confirm the harmlessness of Woolit and initially stuck to it despite research by the Hessischer Rundfunk. Only after violent protests did the regional council examine the Woolit more closely and found that the product was simply waste and that it had never been further processed, as originally approved. Thereupon the regional council prohibited the further production of Woolit and charged the delivery to the North Rhine-Westphalian brickworks as disposal costs in the amount of 180,000 euros, but initially allowed the company to continue processing mineral fibers.
After a wheel loader tore a hole in the outer wall of the production hall in September 2012, the regional council of Gießen temporarily shut down the company. Shortly afterwards, dioxin was measured in the region around the company location, the values in fruit and vegetables from the town are said to have exceeded the dioxin values previously measured in Germany by 10 to 20 times. Nevertheless, the administrative court in Gießen temporarily allowed operations to resume. Shortly thereafter, however, the company voluntarily decided not to resume operations and permanently shut down the production site.
The public prosecutor's office was investigating the manager of Woolrec and the appraiser for the unauthorized handling of hazardous waste . In January 2018, the main hearing against the two defendants began before the Giessen Regional Court . On October 24, 2019, they were sentenced to heavy fines.
Web links
- The Woolrec scandal: toxic waste in several million bricks - Deutschlandfunk
- Chronology of the Woolrec scandal: from showcase project to recycling lie - Hessenschau