The study, sent to UNESCO's Paris headquarters, points out the dangers presented by the power plant to the Tokaj region's potential as a World Heritage site. KÖH acknowledges the investors building the power plant have acquired all of the necessary permits and that preparations for the plant's construction have already begun, but it said the project has not yet passed the point of no return.
Twenty-seven local councils that make up the Historical Winegrowing Region World Heritage Alliance decided unanimously in 2003 to preserve the region's character. But the local council of Szerencs amended its building regulations specifically to allow for the construction of the plant, for example, raising its maximum building height requirement from 9 metres to 30 metres.
KÖH notes that the authorities had considered separately the impacts the plant would have on the region, in terms of the environment, the landscape and safety, and none of them placed any additional requirements on the investors building the plant. For this reason, a unified impact study was never carried out, even though the International Council on Monuments and Sites' (ICOMOS) Northern Hungary Regional Planning Council expressed worry that the amount of biomass the power plant would require could bring even more vehicular traffic to the area, which has already reached the critical point in terms of cars and trucks.
KÖH deputy director Tamás Fejérdy explained that UNESCO must be informed before big developments are made at World Heritage sites. When the UNESCO World Heritage Centre was informed of the power plant project, it requested that Hungary's World Heritage National Commission submit an assessment of the Tokaj region.
Other sites in Hungary included on UNESCO's World Heritage List are the area of Budapest along the Danube, the Castle District and historic Andrássy Avenue, the area around Fertö, or Neusiedlersee, on Hungary's border with Austria, the Hortobágy National Park, better known as the "Puszta" in Hungarian, the Benedictine Abbey of Pannonhalma and the early Christian necropolis of Pécs. On UNESCO's World Heritage List of natural wonders are the caves of Aggtelek, which Hungary shares with Slovakia.
Fejérdy earlier confirmed that Hungary is making preparations to submit applications for three more World Heritage site: the Ripa Pannonica (the Hungarian part of the Roman Limes Danubius line of enforcements along the Danube), the Art Nouveau buildings of the Hungarian architect Ödön Lechner and his contemporaries and the hydrothermal caves and thermal karst systems in Buda. The application for the Lechner buildings will probably be submitted in January 2009, and the application for the Ripa Pannonica a year later Fejérdy said.
Source: Múlt-kor / Hungarian News Agency (MTI)
