The countries of the Danube river basin made two main mistakes :
 the construction of dams on the river to use wetlands for agriculture (early 1970’s). The velocity of the water becomes higher and then it brings more sediments and "suffocates the delta", says Petruta. So the delta needs more dredging and that affects the biodiversity. The higher velocity of the water also makes the floods worse (from 4000 cube meters/seconde to 18 000 when it floods, "like a locomotive"). It even carries the rubbish from the tributaries to the delta ;
 the creation of good conditions for the navigation in the river and in the delta. The Sulina branch is the main one used by ships to get into the river from the Black Sea so Romania, who owns the branch, dug to create a canal and shorten the branch (it was like an "M", it became a straight line). They also dredged because the ships need more water. Then, whereas before these changes it took one month for the water to cross the delta, it now takes only 13 days. So the sediments no longer have time to be deposited.

Since 2007, 8 routes for tourism have been created in the delta (from 7 to 15 routes). Unsustainable tourism (throwing of the rubbish in the nature) is a threat to the delta, and the fundings are very poor for the few projects concerning the delta.

But on the Danube itself, it’s not the navigation for tourism (little developed) that threatens the ecosystem but rather the commercial navigation. Petruta considers that the biggest success of the ICPDR (International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River) was to convince the Navigation Commission (independant) to collaborate with them for the protection of the river. In 2007, they managed to have the 13 Parliaments of the basin sign a join statement to make environment protection and navigation work together.

While private companies are making efforts to get their ships more and more modern (so less and less polluting), countries still own the very old ships which are important polluters for Danube waters. That is one of the reasons ECCG is against the classic navigation on the Danube. But it’s not the only one : modern navigation also means high modules and it’s a problem for the bridges that are not always very high. And as the bridges cannot be opened, the river keeps being dredged.

Several concrete projects especially caught the attention of the ECCG. To explain the case of the ukrainian channel of Bystroe, let’s go back in the past. In 1948, by signing the Belgrade Treaty, the countries of the basin agreed that all the big ships have to use the Sulina canal (the main one, owned by Romania), to and from the Black Sea. It means the ships have to pay Romania to go through. Ukraine wanted to avoid that...

In 2001, Ukraine decided to create a new navigation channel to avoid the romanian one (Sulina), knowing that 10km away from the Sulina branch (on either side) there is already no bird colony any more and fishering has been banned. The opposition to this project was international, first coming from ukrainian NGOs. The ICPDR had to do something, so they came up with this international statement in 2007. In spite of all the warnings from the NGOs and the scientists, Ukraine kept going with this project.

Another project, much bigger, is worrying the defenders of the european biodiversity : the Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T). Initiated by the European Commission, the TEN-T is the planification of a european transport network, by roads, rails, air and rivers. To develop the river traffic in Europe, the TEN-T is making the connection between the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea by digging channels between the main european rivers (Rhine, Oder, Elbe, Danube). Here is the map of this crazy project. There are 21 projects all around Europe to dredge the bottlenecks (that are a bareer to navigation), 8 have already been funded (one of them is romanian). And of course, all these works kill the local biodiversity.

Third case, near Galati, the dredging project of the Danube between Brăila and Călăraşi also caught the attention of the ECCG. In south-east of Romania, the ships can only navigate (upstream) until Brăila. After Brăila, the depth is less than 2,5m. So there is a project to dredge and bring more water between Brăila and Călăraşi. But actually, the navigation is not the only reason : it’s also because the nuclear plant is in this region, along the river, in Cernavodă and it will need more water to be cooled. The NGOs hope that the Fukushima disaster will slow down this project, but it’s quite unlikely, according to Petruta. All these construction works endanger the local biodiversity, especially the sturgeons : this part of the Danube is the only place for these fishes to lay their eggs. There is a ban on fishing sturgeons but their habitats is being destroyed...

In spite of all these criticisms of river navigation, we must admit that it still competes with road traffic and it emits far less CO². However :
 there are other pollutants such as sulphur oxyde ;
 the waste management on board of the ships is too poor, which is another important environmental problem.

Eventually, we also have to notice that in the past 30 years, there has been not so much navigation. The serbian war in Serbia didn’t help because then the ships couldn’t go further than Belgrade where a bridge was demolished. In Galati, even now, there are just barges feeding Arcelor Mittal. And once a month a cruise ship goes up to Vienna.

To conclude these two articles about the Danube, I want to remind you that this river is very lucky to be international. "Lucky" because decisions can be made above the head of the governments of each country. The global interests are stronger than the national ones. In this context, the ICPDR proved to be very influent and strong. It can do many things that not one single country could do. For example, every 6 years, they take hundreds of samples all along the Danube to analyse the pollutants. Each country helps them to do the operations (by providing money, experts, equipments...), even Ukraine which is not in the EU.

I hope you learnt some things from these two articles and you found it interesting. Next step for me : articles about Copenhagen, where I just spent a week.

See you soon, Be green, Ben