EELV calls for the cancellation of the Lafarge cement plant expansion project in Paris XV

The hearing in the administrative court concerning the request for annulment of the prefectural decree authorizing the expansion of the cement works was to be held on December 3, but the Lafarge company "avoided losing by asking for the cancellation of this decree. It's a victory, "said Julien Bayou, national secretary of EELV, during a video conference.

"Lafarge is the second French polluter and is in the World Top 50", he added, calling for "the tightening of sanctions against polluters".

But "this cancellation will allow the Lafarge company to file another less restrictive operating project, below the regulatory and legislative thresholds requiring consultation of the population," warns EELV.

Recalling that "the revelations on the pollution of the Seine by the group have multiplied", environmentalists and associations "demand the resumption of the consultation of the population". They will make this request at the next Paris Council, "next week".

The Paris Council had already voted, on October 7, to suspend the expansion work on the Lafarge cement plant site, the time for consultation with local residents. But "for the moment, the consultation is a dialogue of the deaf," regretted Maryse Fourcade, of the Association of residents of the port of Javel, who brought the appeal against Lafarge.

For Christine Nedelec, president of France Environnement Paris, "pollution from cement manufacturers is recurring" and in Paris, "we cannot achieve a reduction in concreteization".

"Five years after the Paris Agreement (during the Cop21), nothing is done concerning the use of pesticides", also lamented Mr. Bayou. He wants the big rivers, like the Seine, to become "proper legal subjects", like what has been done "in New Zealand", and therefore protected from polluters.

The subject was sensitive after the broadcast at the re-entry of images of the Lafarge factory, located in the Bercy district (south-east of the capital), pouring into the Seine a mixture of "cement particles, treatment liquids and plastic microfibers ".

The Paris public prosecutor's office has opened an investigation for "suspected pollution of the Seine by a public works company".

Lafarge claims that the flow is the result of "an exceptional accident caused by a malicious act".