According to a press release from the local authorities, the analyzes “showed the presence of fluorescein in the samples taken”.
He added that the results “did not prove the presence of toxic elements in the samples that were analyzed”, without specifying the origin of the presence of fluorescein in the Grand Canal.
Fluorescein is typically used to track the path of networks or to identify reflections between sewage and stormwater networks.
Earlier on Sunday, a number of locals reported the waters of the Grand Canal changing color, amid much speculation, prompting the governor of Venice to hold an emergency meeting of police forces to understand what happened and study possible measures to combat it.
Environmental protest checks
Italian media sources have suggested that environmental lobby groups may be behind the water staining incident, to draw attention to the seriousness of the accelerating rate of environmental deterioration around the world , and that what is more likely is that the material used is non-toxic and harmless. .
This raises, according to experts and observers, the need to take into account the controls of the modes of protest and rejection in the face of the worsening of the phenomenon of climate change, so that they do not contribute to further complicate the problem instead to raise awareness and call for its solution through peaceful means and without the use of materials and dyes that can have negative and harmful effects.
Ayman Qaddouri, environmental expert and member of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, said in an interview with Sky News Arabia:
* Unfortunately, the major industrialized countries continue to harm the environment by continuing to use traditional energy sources, by slowing down the process of energy transition and by not respecting the legislation of the climate summits, in particular by helping countries developing countries to deal with the dangers of climate change and its effects which cause abrupt changes and fluctuations in the weather, the results of which have become clearly visible through the environmental disasters that are hitting the globe in various forms.
* That is why, alongside the increase in environmental danger threatening the world, the pace of protests is accelerating from organizations and groups defending the environment and calling for the commitment of governments to implement implements what is legislated from international laws, to reduce the phenomenon of global warming, which serves as fuel for the exacerbation of the process of climate change.
* Especially in southern European countries, which suffer from the enormity of environmental impacts and natural disasters, especially those that have occurred in the last five years, which have revealed the fragility of preparedness and preparedness systems for coping with natural disasters in Europe in general, and their inability to cope with climatic crises such as drought, forest fires and floods.
* In addition to the spread of other fires on the South American continent in parts of the Amazon forests, specifically in Brazil, and floods on the African continent with successive droughts in parts of North America, in particular in Canada.
* Thus, the protest initiatives have spread widely around the world and clearly on the European continent, to the extent that the fingers behind what happened in Italy to color the water of the main canal of Venice in bright green, went to environmental activists, especially as Italian authorities have over the past few weeks monitored more than a similar situation in different parts of the country.
* Some of the materials used in such cases to color water, other than fluorescein which has been discovered, may be harmful, such as organic matter (CDOM) which harms aquatic organisms, especially aquatic plants, and inhibits the efficiency of photosynthesis, and it is used in the laboratory to study water properties and determine purity by color gradient.
* There is no doubt that organized and peaceful demonstration, far from harming public opinion, is a right guaranteed by international conventions and human rights laws, provided that it does not infringe harm to public opinion, and on the environmental level that it leaves no environmental traces. effects that can be deadlier and negatively impact faster than the process of climate change itself.
series of accidents
Initial speculation that environmental lobby groups were behind the incident, based on what Italy recently witnessed, where environmental groups stained monuments, including the use of charcoal to blacken the water of the Trevi Fountain in Rome, in protest against the use of fossil fuels.
It is not the first time that the color of the waters of the Grand Canal has turned green. In 1968, the Argentinian artist Nicholas García Uriburu threw green paint into these waters, on the sidelines of the 34th Venice Film Festival, in a gesture aimed at raising awareness of environmental issues.
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