The Norwegian Environmental Protection Association has complained to the Norwegian authorities to ESA in the mercury submarine case (U-864).
The complaint to ESA is heavy and extensive, and shows that the Norwegian authorities can be guilty of environmental crime.
For 17 years, the submarine has lain in two parts at a depth of 150 meters outside Fedje in Hordaland. Norway breaks laws and regulations for the storage of mercury, waste management and pollution of the water environment.
Norway violates the EU's mercury regulation, the Minamata Convention for mercury, the OSPAR Convention for the North Sea Basin and the Water Directive.
The authorities are planning an illegal act
In the ESA complaint, it appears that the Norwegian Coastal Administration has recommended and planned an illegal covering of the submarine and the surrounding seabed.
The Coastal Administration should have known that they were instructed by the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Coastal and Fisheries to plan an illegal act, and as a professional directorate should have known that it is illegal to cover the world's largest point discharge of mercury into the marine environment, -67 tonnes. Now the authorities have not done anything about the mercury for 17 years, the risk of emissions is increasing all the time.
The Norwegian Environmental Protection Association shows in the complaint that the compact accumulation of mercury in the cargo keel must be defined as "landfill" and not contaminated seabed, as emergency manager at the Coastal Administration, Hans Petter Lahne Mortensholm says.
No danger of the ammunition going off during an elevation
The ESA complaint has a contribution from the Swedish Armed Forces' Defense Materiel Administration (FMA), which has reviewed the risk of ammunition in the event of a lift. There is virtually zero risk in raising U-864 with the ammunition on board.
Now is the time to stimulate competence environments within underwater operations in Western Norway to bring up the mercury submarine. We have the expertise and technology to be able to take the submarine up safely and without any leakage of mercury into the environment.
The ESA complaint also shows a lifting method developed by Unitech Energy Group that takes safety and the environment into account, and NMF supports this method.
New jobs and skills development in Western Norway.
A raising of U-864 will provide work and competence development on underwater operations nationally and internationally on clean-up from poison and ammunition in shipwrecks. Norway will be a leader in this.
The Norwegian Environmental Protection Association believes that Erna Solberg's project "Cleaner Sea" should support raising the mercury submarine and cleaning up the mercury. It's for the best in the long run, as we can never trust a methylation test in an aquarium and a computer.
2.3 billion blown away...
Of the total of 3 billion for "Cleaner Sea", the Solberg government through ENOVA allocated a total of 2.3 billion for 17 giant wind turbines. We cannot see how it helps to clean up litter in the sea, rather the opposite. The wind turbine blades will release tons of microplastics into the marine environment that enter the food chain. The same mistake is made with mercury if it is not removed from the marine environment. The Norwegian Environmental Protection Association wants to prevent a serious environmental crime with long-term effects from being committed by the Norwegian authorities.
We want Transport Minister Knut Arild Hareide and Petter Nedrås Falkung, Deputy Director of the Coastal and Environment Department in the Ministry of Transport to read the ESA case carefully, and propose that the lifting of U-864 be included in the revised national budget.
Raising U-864 and cleaning the seabed is the only solution
Read the complaint and the letter to the authorities!
English 
Norwegian 
