East German Town’s Bitter Image

There’s a German saying that “if we don’t see each other again in this world, we’ll see each other in Bitterfeld.”

To suggest that Bitterfeld is a kind of nether world is not far from the truth. Bitterfeld is described as the most polluted city in East Germany, which is sometimes called the “cesspool of Europe,” among the most polluted of all countries.

“They should change the name of Bitterfeld to Agent Orange,” a West German journalist who was born in nearby Leipzig and once reported from Vietnam remarked to a recent visitor.

Indeed, the name of the grim, sullen city means bitter field, though it was christened long before the development of the coal mines and the chemical and power plants that have given the city its reputation as the dirtiest town in Europe.

Bitterfeld, population 20,000, is afflicted with a variety of forms of pollution. The skies are almost always hazy from dust and coal particles rising from enormous open-pit mines, and gases pouring out of the tall stacks that surround the town. The water is soured with nitrates from fertilizers.

The fallout in Bitterfeld’s streets runs to more than a pound of particles per square yard per month.

“We have serious lung disease problems,” said City Councilman Rainer Fromman, who is in charge of environmental matters. “We get the coal particles from the mines and now that the topsoil is gone, we get silicon dust as well. Sometimes the visibility is so bad it’s hard to drive.

“We believe the life expectancy here is five years lower than in other parts of the country. But it’s difficult to tell because all the figures on disease in this area were considered top secret until recently.”

Under the Communists, local officials were forbidden to take pollution samples or to make public any information on the subject.

To give Bitterfeld schoolchildren a taste of fresh air, classes are moved to an island in the Baltic Sea for a month each year.

Bitterfeld’s neighbors fare little better. Just up the road is Wolfen, where the nation’s largest photochemical plant is situated. Its dozen stacks produce stinging emissions.

Indeed, the pollution problem is nationwide. In Leipzig, authorities report that a smog alarm should be sounded every day--if there were such an alarm.

A recent poll in the West German magazine Spiegel indicated that East Germans’ desire for a better environment ranks second only to their desire for democracy.

During the 40 years of Communist rule, much of the country’s industrial plant became outdated and inefficient, emitting pollutants of every kind. West German experts say that if their standards were applied to East Germany, half the industrial plant would have to be shut down.

Kurt Lietzman, the Environment Ministry official from Bonn who liaisons with East Germany, put it this way: “The whole economy has to be reconstructed. East Germany is decades behind Western standards.”

In part, East Germany’s pollution woes can be traced to the main source of energy: brown coal, which when burned produces noxious sulfur dioxide. East Germany has Europe’s highest level of sulfur dioxide emissions, which are widely blamed for acid rain, which in turn is killing forests.

Chemical plants discharge untreated effluents directly into rivers. One plant, near Halle, pumps 50 pounds of mercury into the Saale River every day, 10 times as much as the West German chemical giant BASF in Ludwigshaven puts into the Rhine in a year.

An estimated 20% of the country’s water is so polluted that it cannot be used, according to Peter Diederich, minister of the environment. The Elbe has acquired the dubious distinction of being Europe’s most polluted river.

The two-stroke motor vehicles on East German roads burn the cheapest form of gasoline and diesel oil, further contaminating the atmosphere.

Fritz Vahrenholt, an environment official in Hamburg, estimates that 100 billion marks ($60 billion) will be needed over the next 10 years to clean up East Germany.

In his Spartan Bitterfeld office, Councilman Fromman showed a visitor letters from various Western European environmental firms offering suggestions and aid for cleaning up the atmosphere.

“I think help is coming,” he said. “People live in Bitterfeld because of the higher wages and available housing. But 40,000 have left in 10 years, so there is a high turnover. This is a terrible state of affairs here. We need a new government to do something about pollution.

“That is a reason why people want reunification (with West Germany). They believe that then the atmosphere and living conditions will improve.”