Venue: SCRC-Czech Republic, Research Centre for Toxic Compounds in the Environment (RECETOX), Kamenice 753/5, pavilon A29, Brno, Czech RepublicBackground:
Sixth Meeting of the Advisory Committee of the PCB Elimination Network (PEN): Pursuant to decision SC-5/7 on PCB, adopted at the fifth meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Stockholm Convention (SC-COP5), the BRS Secretariat had facilitated a sustainable transition of the leadership of the PEN to UNEP. In its function as the secretariat of the PEN, UNEP Chemicals and Waste Branch has since worked in close collaboration with the BRS Secretariat to facilitate the work of the PEN.According to its terms of reference, the Advisory Committee of the PEN is expected to meet at least once a year. UNEP Chemicals and Waste Branch organised the fifth meeting of the Advisory Committee in Geneva from 26 to 27 November 2014. The report of the meeting is contained in UNEP's report on progress in implementing the PEN, which was submitted to the SC-COP7 in document UNEP/POPS/COP.7/INF10.During the fifth meeting of the Advisory Committee, the PEN secretariat provided an update on activities undertaken, the composition of the Advisory Committee and PEN membership, financial issues, and other matters. The leads and/or co-leads of each Thematic Group provided updates on the activities that had been carried out and the progress made in implementing the workplan. The BRS Secretariat, UNIDO and UNEP provided updates on their work relevant to PCB in general and the PEN in particular. The Advisory Committee members reviewed and revised the workplan and elected the leads and co-leads of each Thematic Group. They also discussed and endorsed the draft Preliminary assessment of efforts toward eliminating PCB, which had been prepared by UNEP Chemicals and Waste Branch in collaboration with the BRS Secretariat. Finally, the Advisory Committee adopted conclusions and recommendations for consideration at the SC-COP7, as contained in the annex to document UNEP/POPS/COP.7/6.The main purpose of the sixth meeting of the Advisory Committee is to review the workplan and budget of the PEN as well as to discuss its strategy for the coming years. In addition, the Advisory Committee will have an opportunity to provide expert advice on the consolidated assessment of efforts made towards the elimination of PCB.
Effectiveness Evaluation of Implementation of the Stockholm Convention for PCB: In its leadership role within the PEN, UNEP Chemicals and Waste branch, in cooperation with the BRS Secretariat and in consultation with the PEN Advisory Committee, developed a preliminary assessment of efforts made towards the elimination of PCB. The assessment was presented to the SC-COP7 in May 2015 as document UNEP/POPS/COP.7/INF/9. This was in response to a request in decision SC-6/6 adopted at the SC-COP6.The assessment aimed to summarize available information on the amounts of PCB produced, eliminated to date, and still in need of elimination. As the information available from the third national reports was found insufficient to fulfil the mandate, additional sources of information were consulted, including national implementation plans (NIPs), national reports under the Basel Convention, Global Environment Facility (GEF) projects, technical reports, and a survey. In compiling and evaluating the data, numerous challenges were encountered, resulting in some important limitations as regards the statistical analysis and the conclusions to be drawn. Most notably, the vast majority of national inventories were found to be preliminary and very limited in scope and coverage.This report, including the above-mentioned additional sources, estimates that between 1.6 and 3.1 million tonnes of PCB have been destroyed. The total mass of PCB equipment and materials that still needs to be eliminated was estimated at ca. 9.3 million tonnes. Based on these data, it is estimated that approximately 20 % of the total amount of PCB has been eliminated to date about 80 % remain to be destroyed. The limited data available are sufficient to highlight the need to expedite and intensify efforts to eliminate PCB to meet the 2025/2028 goals of the Stockholm Convention.In its decision SC-7/3, the COP took note of the assessment and requested the BRS Secretariat to consolidate it and to make the consolidated version available by 31 January 2016 to the effectiveness evaluation committee and to submit the report to the SC-COP8. The main purpose of the current meeting is to gather feedback and expert input on the draft consolidated assessment. The participants will receive the draft consolidated assessment as soon as possible and prior to the meeting for their review. In the meantime, the participants are strongly encouraged to familiarize themselves with the preliminary assessment submitted to SC-COP7 (UNEP/POPS/COP.7/INF/9).
Working Language:English
Date:
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Region:
Country:
Czech Republic
City:
Brno
Treaty:
Topics:
Event type:
Expert
Event kind:
Official