'Unrest' in Binh Yen village

Binh Yen village (Nam Ninh commune, Ninh Binh province) has always been a "black spot" of environmental pollution for many years. Although authorities at all levels from the province to the grassroots have always paid attention to investing in many projects to "rescue" the village's environment, so far they have not been effective.

Workers perform the aluminum rolling process.

Polluted environment

Present in Binh Yen village, Nam Ninh commune, Ninh Binh province on the autumn days of September, we witnessed with our own eyes the village roads and alleys in Binh Yen filled with bags of coal slag, wood chips... gathered to serve the casting of aluminum waste; streams of black wastewater from the activity of washing and polishing aluminum products with chemicals slowly flowing down the sewers and ditches into the ditch in front of the village, emitting an unpleasant smell; along with that was the rumbling sound of molding machines and stamping machines.

Binh Yen village is more than 72 hectares wide, has 520 households (including hamlets 1 and 2) with 1,752 people; the number of households producing and recycling aluminum accounts for about 30%, the rest are agricultural production, service business, civil servants, public employees and workers at production facilities and factories in neighboring localities. The village was recognized as a craft village specializing in mechanical production of aluminum recycling according to Decision No. 1470/QD-UBND dated October 1, 2012 of the People's Committee of Nam Dinh province (old), however, by 2025, according to Decision No. 775/QD-UBND dated April 16, 2025, the People's Committee of Nam Dinh province (old) removed Binh Yen craft village from the list of craft villages because the production industries in the list of industries not encouraged for development have a high risk of causing environmental pollution.

Head of Binh Yen 2 hamlet, Tran Van Tien, said that the entire Binh Yen village has 170 households participating in production, including 77 households casting scrap aluminum; 27 households mechanically processing aluminum products and 66 households manufacturing, shaping, and dipping. The raw material for production is scrap aluminum with about 400 tons/month, creating household aluminum products such as pots, pans, and pans... and aluminum ingots about 360 tons/month with about 1,000 workers. Because the development of Binh Yen craft village is spontaneous, the technology is backward, and the awareness of environmental protection of producers is low, the environmental pollution caused by aluminum recycling production is at an alarming level.

Aluminum ingots are collected after being cast from scrap.

According to the report of the People's Committee of Nam Ninh commune, the current wastewater situation of the village is domestic wastewater and wastewater from production activities are both discharged directly into the environment; the wastewater receiving source is Truc river in front of the village, about 864 m long, and the river to the East of the village, about 561 m long. These two rivers are currently in a state of heavy pollution due to wastewater generated from the process of dipping, bleaching, and washing aluminum products containing many heavy metals such as Ca, Zn, AL, Acid, and caustic soda that have not been treated, leading to the appearance of a layer of sludge 0.9 m to 2 m thick on the river surface, the surface of the sludge layer contains hazardous waste; the indirect wastewater source is Ba Con river in the North of the village, about 400 m long, receiving wastewater after sedimentation in the regulating lake and gradually draining into Hang river in the West of the village.

Along with that, although the parameters of the air environment around the village are all within the allowable limits, two additional parameters, H2S04 and HCL, were detected in the samples, which are two parameters that arise during the washing process using acid as raw materials.

Failed rescue

In recent times, all levels and sectors of Nam Dinh province (old) have implemented many projects with billions of VND to reduce environmental pollution here, but they have not been effective. A typical example is the project "Overcoming pollution and improving the environment of Binh Yen mechanical craft village, Nam Thanh commune, Nam Truc district, Nam Dinh province" invested by the Department of Natural Resources and Environment of Nam Dinh province (old) with a total investment of about 100 billion VND; implementation period from 2013 - 2018 with items such as solid waste storage, wastewater treatment system with a capacity of 500 m3/day and night, sand settling tank, equalization tank...

By 2020-2021, the village will continue to receive investment in the Project "Construction of environmental treatment items for Binh Yen craft village, Nam Thanh commune, Nam Truc district" with the People's Committee of Nam Truc district (old) as the investor with an investment of nearly 10 billion VND; including items such as a regulating lake, construction of a 1,000 m long sewer connecting wastewater from the regulating lake to the treatment area... and the Project "Dredging and treating environmental canals for Binh Yen craft village, Nam Thanh commune" with the People's Committee of Nam Thanh commune (old) as the investor.

However, up to now, the system for collecting and treating wastewater generated from production activities is not working, the reason is that untreated wastewater from households is directly discharged into the Truc River system, leading to blockage and not being able to drain to the regulating lake; the pump system is not working due to caustic corrosion, leading to direct discharge of wastewater from production, causing congestion and flooding of the rivers and drainage ditches of the village. Although the exhaust system has been tested and treated many times by many units, there is still no effective model, untreated emissions pollute the air environment; the canal system around the village after being dredged continues to be stagnant due to many suspended impurities that cannot be drained.

Prepare raw materials such as scrap aluminum for recycling.

According to Chairman of the People's Committee of Nam Ninh Commune, Luu Van Dung, in order to thoroughly handle environmental pollution in Binh Yen village, the commune is considering two fundamental solutions: changing occupations for households and relocating polluting establishments to Nam Thanh 1 Industrial Cluster (near Binh Yen village, where the investment process is underway).

However, both of the above solutions are difficult to implement because with the solution of converting occupations, the locality currently does not know how to mobilize people to convert to suitable occupations; along with that, when implementing the conversion, many resources are needed to implement support policies according to regulations. Regarding the solution of relocating households that are producing out of residential areas, concentrating in industrial clusters, but currently Nam Thanh 1 Industrial Cluster is just implementing the investment process.

When households move into industrial clusters, they must fulfill financial obligations regarding land; according to regulations, the minimum production area in an industrial cluster is 5,000 m2. With the current land price of about 3 million VND/m2, the cost of acquiring land is very high, not to mention building factories and contributing other expenses, so relocating production households into industrial clusters is also difficult to achieve.

In the immediate future, in order to minimize environmental pollution, Nam Ninh commune continues to propagate and mobilize production facilities and households in craft villages to implement environmental protection measures according to the provisions of law; implement measures to minimize dust, heat radiation, wastewater and treat environmental pollution on-site, collect, classify and treat solids according to regulations; require shaping production households not to use chemical metal surface cleaning technology but mainly use mechanical cleaning technology; casting households must invest in applying emission treatment technology that meets the permitted standards. At the same time, the commune government focuses resources on dredging and treating sludge in rivers and canals around the village and in the village; maintain stable operations of the Binh Yen Village Environmental Cooperative.

Source: https://baotintuc.vn/cong-dong/bat-ono-thon-binh-yen-20250918122004179.htm