Baikal’sk Industry

Our time had been going well in the small town of Baikal’sk, a stop over to re-supply and a chance to communicate with family and friends. While the town appears economically depressed colorful banners cross the streets reminiscing of a strawberry festival already passed.

The town looks out onto the massive lake, nestled in front of towering mountains with the tell tale clearings of ski resorts. For an instant I believed that this would be an amazing spot to vacation. Then the wind changed direction and putrid air filled our hotel room, the unmistakable smell of the only pulp and paper mill situated on Lake Baikal.

To the east, on the shores of the lake stand the dominating smoke stacks of Biakal’sk’s industry. Originally opened in 1966 the mill was meant to provide high quality cord for aircraft wheels. Eventually synthetic materials outperformed organic cord and the mill was converted to other uses. From the beginning, the mills creation had been relented on the grounds that it would pollute the lake harming it’s over 1600 endemic species. It was due to those concerns that the mill closed down on October 2nd, 2008.

However when Putin, today’s Prime Minister of Russian, visited the lake’s depth by submarine he announced the prospect of re-opening the mill, in part to help the 1600 employees who had lost their jobs when the mill first closed. To combat environmental issues, it was suggested that the mill run a closed fluid system so that the effluent would not flow into the lake as before. Hopefully this recommendation is being taken seriously, however it does nothing for the current smell dominated my hotel room.

By Eric McNair-Landry