"Envimonitor" will reduce Kyiv's air quality by 40 million //Petr Panteleev, Alexander Vozny //KV collage</p
Kyiv City State Administration's Department of Ecology and Natural Resources will use 40 million hryvnias from the capital budget to set up two air pollution monitoring stations. Envimonitor LLC will implement the creation of a monitoring system for the environment. The company was established just before the first contract and its main client is the city's environmental department. State auditors were puzzled by the new order for monitoring posts during martial law, and the environmental department could not explain this purchase.
According to the ProZorro electronic system announcement, the Kyiv City State Administration's Department of Ecology and Natural Resources signed a contract with Envimonitor LLC for 39.67 million hryvnias for the installation of stationary monitoring posts for air pollution in Kyiv on December 12, 2022.
According to the contract, Envimonitor LLC must supply, install and put into operation two air pollution monitoring posts by the end of December 2022.
Each post will include a weather station, an ambient air sampling system, and an analyzer to check for sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, carbon monoxide, ozone, and benzene in the air. They will also have air conditioning, ventilation, grounding, warning, and remote control systems, and will be connected to software to send data to a server.
The posts are planned to be set up at Victory Avenue, 97 (Svyatoshinsky district) and Kitaevskaya Street, 22 (Goloseevsky district), with the possibility of address changes during the installation process.
The State Audit Service in early December questioned the need for ordering air quality monitoring posts during martial law, and the environmental department could not justify the purchase in the current conditions.
Envimonitor LLC has been creating a software and hardware system for monitoring the environment in Kyiv since 2018 under the commission of the Department of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Kyiv City State Administration. Since then, there have been multiple agreements between the parties, including inventory of pollution sources, delivery and installation of monitoring posts, and maintenance of the monitoring system.
In theory, there should be 5 posts in the capital installed by the environmental department of the KSCA already, but it's not possible to check their work yet because the link posted on the website of the environmental department of the KSCA doesn't work.
According to the target program “Ecological well-being for 2019-2021”, 80 million hryvnias (40 million hryvnias in 2020 and 2021) were supposed to be allocated for the creation of an urban system of software and hardware for collecting and processing data on the state of the environment in Kyiv. The Department for Ecology and Natural Resources of the Kyiv City State Administration explained that the system's creation is planned in two phases. The first phase was to create a data center, technical software, two stationary air monitoring posts, and one calibrator. The second phase was to install additional software and build 19 stationary and one mobile air monitoring post.
Over time, the spending plans for this system by city officials have significantly increased. The city's “Environmental well-being for 2022-2025” program includes another 240 million hryvnias (60 million hryvnias annually) for, among other things, installing 12 air quality observation points within four years.
In October 2022, the Kyiv City Council supported a draft decision on approving the State Monitoring Program for the protection of atmospheric air in the Kyiv agglomeration. This document continues the creation of the “Urban system of software and hardware for collecting and processing data on the state of the environment” and allocates 240 million hryvnias for this purpose during 2022-2025. The funds are planned to be used to install three monitoring posts for four years, although different sections of the document mention 17 points instead of 12, without specifying the reason for the discrepancy.
Earlier, KV reported that alongside the Department of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Kyiv City State Administration's creation of the city's system for collecting and processing data on the environment, another air monitoring system is being introduced in the capital using budgetary funds. It is called the System for Obtaining Measurement Parameters about the State of the Environment and the Internal Environment within the Concept of the Internet of Things and is being created by the Informatics utility company. Both systems require significant budgetary resources, and questions have been raised about their necessity, considering the existing systems could be modernized instead, including the Central Geophysical Observatory, according to the expert community.
While lots of money from the city budget is being used to try to set up air quality monitoring in the city, the air quality keeps getting worse and government offices don't want to talk about it. Members of the Kyiv City Council, public activists, and experts have pointed out that the people of the city often suffer from smog, and the city is getting a bad reputation internationally because of air pollution. The reasons for this situation are too many vehicles, the Energia waste incineration plant, some dangerous industries, and thermal power plants.
In the past, the Department of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Kyiv City State Administration didn't effectively implement the Environmental Well-Being Program, despite receiving a lot of money for it. In 2020, the department spent 1.85 billion hryvnias on the program, completing 88.3% of the planned activities. However, the activities didn't do much to improve the environment, mainly focusing on maintaining beaches, parks, treatment facilities, and buying planting materials. Additionally, in the previous year, officials didn't work on projects such as the Partisan Glory landscape park, a complex for handling plant waste, and an aeration system for Lake Lebedino. Instead, money was allocated for the reconstruction and improvement of Kyoto Park and Dolobets Island.
The Youcontrol analytical system says that Envimonitor LLC was established in Kyiv in 2018. The authorized capital is UAH 153.89 thousand. The main work involves studying and experimenting in other natural and technical sciences. The founders and main beneficiaries are Oleg Vovchenko and Viktor Belov, who are registered in Sevastopol.
It's important to mention that Viktor Yuryevich Belov, who has the same name as the head of Envimonitor LLC, ran in the extraordinary parliamentary elections of 2014 for the party of the ex-Minister of Defense Anatoly Gritsenko's “Civil Position”. At that time, Belov was the Deputy Chairman of the Board at PJSC “Ukrainian Institute for the Design and Development of Information and Communication Infrastructure” Diprosvyaz. Oleksiy Hrytsenko, the son of Anatoly Hrytsenko, has been advising the Mayor of Kyiv, Vitaliy Klitschko, on environmental matters since April 5, 2021.
Based on their participation in public procurement, Envimonitor LLC signed 6 contracts worth almost UAH 120 million. The biggest customer is the Department of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Kyiv City State Administration, which awarded 5 of the contracts worth a total of UAH 118.66 million. These contracts are for creating a system for collecting and processing data on the environment in Kyiv. Additionally, Envimonitor got a contract from the Chernivtsi Regional Center for Hydrometeorology for supplying equipment for monitoring atmospheric air for almost UAH 700,000.
Oleg Vovchenko is the owner and co-owner of four more companies, of which two – Enviproject LLC and Envi Company LLC – are also active participants in public procurement. At the same time, their customers are exclusively capital KP and PJSC “AK” Kievvodokanal. Thus, Enviproject LLC signed 11 contracts, the largest customer is PJSC AK Kyivvodokanal, and Envi Company LLC signed 2 contracts – both with KP Zhilinveststroy-UKB.
By the way, LLC Envy Company, together with Oleg Vovchenko, is owned by Ruslan Tsyuman, who in 2015 unsuccessfully ran for the Kyiv City Council from the Renaissance party (previously owned by the late Kharkiv mayor Gennady Kernes and ex-regional Vitaly Khomutinnik, since 2019 the party has actually ceased to operate).
The Department of Ecology and Natural Resources of the Kyiv City State Administration has been headed by Alexander Vozny since February 11, 2021 (in the collage on the right). The work of this structure has been controlled by the Deputy Chairman of the Kyiv City State Administration Petr Panteleev (on the collage on the left) for more than seven years.
* Envimonitor LLC (EDRPOU code: 42285420)
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