Indra Harsaputra, Surabaya – The central government is sticking by its decision to dump mud from the Lapindo disaster into the Porong river despite protests from the local community and environmental activists, claiming it is the best way to deal with the problem.
Deputy chief of operations for the Sidoarjo Mudflow Mitigation Agency (BPLS) Soffian Hadi said the government would not revise presidential decree No. 14/2007, which permits mud to be dumped into the river.
"We are conducting research on the effectiveness of dumping, to convince the public it really is the best solution to the problem," Soffian told The Jakarta Post on Friday.
"We will disclose the research results to the public," he said, adding the study was being conducted by several teams appointed by the government.
Since October 2006, five months after the mudflow began, 69 million cubic meters of mud containing oil and gas have been dumped into the Porong river – an amount reportedly equivalent to 43 million barrels of oil.
The river's depth has significantly dropped from six or seven meters to around three or four, exposing a kilometer-long mud sediment along the river's basin that measures between two and five meters in thickness.
The sediment has caused protests among the local community, particularly because of its bad odor and the overflow of river water it has caused.
Despite the sedimentation, hot mud is still flowing out to sea, Soffian said, adding the sediment would not cause floods as it will turn into sand once the rainy season begins.
"There in nothing wrong with the Porong river. I have checked it and made a detailed study of it. The water flow will carry away the hot mud at a rate of 200 cubic meters per second," he said.
The river current will dramatically increase to 1,600 cubic meters per second during the rainy season, he added.
According to Soffian, sediment has built up along the basin due to a lack of water. For this reason, BPLS has deployed five dredging ships to break it up, allowing it to flow out to sea.
PBLS has also decreased the volume of mud dumped into the river by between 20 and 40 percent, he said.
Some of the mud has been flown to a newly built 300-hectare pond in the Tanggulangin Sejahtera residential compound, Soffian added, as well as to the 370-hectare reservoir near Kedungbendo and Renokenongo villages.
Mud in the latter has reached a depth of between eight and nine meters, drying to the point that village residents are able to ride bicycles and motorbikes on the pond's surface, with children victimized by the disaster using it as a playground.
"We will not build a new pond for the mudflow," Soffian said.
The mudflow has reportedly been expelling about 100,000 cubic meters of mud a day and is predicted to cease in 10 to 15 years.