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Health data as evidence

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Data infrastructure supporting recognition of the anthropocenic air pollution in the context of the 6th Naphtha plants is the collection of health related and biological data, as it could be one possibility to sue. The data collected in scientific studies mentioned in the film were the concentration of a certain metabolite (produced when being exposed to VCM) in the bodies of children visiting the schools nearby and the incidence of cancer in the surrounding area. Doing medical and epidemiological research on these topics could help to set regulations. And - and that's maybe even more important to the people affected - if you can prove that you got a disease from being near the factory, you might be able to sue.

The intersection of disability studies and environmental justice movement

ATroitzsch

I think what is very striking in this text, is the author puts her perspective of the disability studies and uses it to draw lines from the disability studies, more particular the queer black disability studies, to the environmental justice movement. From reading the text, I think one can see, that Julia Belser is very involved in disability studies and the field of critical medicine/ psychology. The way she describes that we should turn away from always seeking to get (back) the pure nature, the healthy environment, the "healthy" body, she reminded me of the general idea of overcoming pure categories (for example Latour etc.) - and dualisms. Additionally, I think one could locate her in the area of inequality studies and the field analyzing structural violence.

Oysterfarms

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One ecosystem mentioned in the film was the one of oysters  -which actually is also man-made, as it is an oyster-farm - but I think it becomes very clear in the film that it became more difficult to the oyster-farmers to cultivate the oysters through the 6th Naphtha petrochemical complex. The farmers talk about  mud and other new circumstances that kill the larvae of the oysters. In this context, this is also affecting the socio-sphere, and the impact on the eco-sphere is not so much highlighted in the film, but I think it would be interesting to look further in this point.

Our body is more sensitive

ATroitzsch
Annotation of

The technical infrastructure that is supposed to monitor fixed pollution sources by law is not working properly in the case of the 6th Naphtha (- or it is made to work not properly). There should be CEMS “Continuous Emission Monitoring System” installed directly at some of the chimneys, and there was data produced by the systems, showing a lot of cases of excessive emission - but data was described to be invalid due to maintenance of the apparatus. The activists describe this as a loophole. It is interesting here, how standards and monitoring is not only a question of what is asked by law or regulated by law, but also what happens to avoid these regulations. So what civic data is needed here? It would be the measurements of the CEMS  or from other monitoring systems not only at the plant, but for example nearby the school. As one activist stresses in the documentary, there were for example infrared thermometers at one school, that recorded the heat of the accident mentioned in the film. This is an example for civic data.  It was also interesting here, how a person in the film said, that their own bodies monitor the pollution (“Our body is more sensitive”): they feel in their bodies, what the monitoring devices supposedly do not notice. 

Subjectivities of 6th Naphtha

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One could say that there are several subjectivities produced in the context of the 6th Naphtha petrochemical complex: being someone who suffers from a disease or the smell, the risk to get health issues due to the exposure to the polluted air; being an activist who fights against formosa company, being a oyster farmer who has become politicised by the environmental pollution. In this context, for me it is the point of being at risk is very interesting, as it seems to lead people to different kinds of action: to produce knowledge about these risks, to relocate children from one school to another etc.