Bucharest was confronted, yesterday morning, with the most important pollution of last two years. A pipe providing black oil for CET (Electric Plant for District Heating) Grozavesti broke and an important quantity of fuel ebbed down the road and on the green areas, including the sewerage system of the city. The pipe, linking the Cotroceni Station and CET, cleaved at about 5:00 hrs, at the crossroads of Vasile Milea and Iuliu Maniu boulevards. The fuel leaked on the carriageway of the two roads and on the green areas of the Leu students' campus as well as into the sewerage network of the city. After the fuel pumping had been stopped, the teams of the Inspectorate for Emergency Situations worked, for approximately two hours, at removing the black oil and washing the road with water and foam. Under these circumstances, traffic was interrupted for an hour in the neighbourhood of the Leu students' campus. (L.M., G.M.) Fines of 100,000 lei Viorel Glaman, chief inspector of the Bucharest Environment Guard, said that CET Grozavesti would be applied two fines: one for an accidental pollution and the other for the failure in observing the provisions of the integrated environmental authorization. "Each fine will be to an amount of 100,000 lei (a billion of old lei)", Glaman said. ApaNova informed that the water supplying system of the Capital waqs not affected. In addition to this, the director of the Water Management System of the Ilfov County, Cristian Teodorescu, said that the polluting tide kept on decreasing yesterday afternoon. "When we had been informed about the event, we installed absorbing dams and we waited. There were only some black oil iridescence down the Dambovita Riverthat could easily be removed", Teodorescu added. (L.M., G.M.) Pipe has recently been replaced "The reasons this lack of watertightness (i.e. cleft) appeared at the pipe carrying black oil to CET Grozavesti shall be determined after the leaked black oil is cleaned out and the underground area where the pipe is located is checked", says the Press Office of the Ministry of Economy and Trade (Ro.: MEC), in whose subordination CET Grozavesti is. CET Grozavesti executives are now repairing the damage and are cleaning the affected areas, MEC adds. Sources from Termoelectrica Comp. told us that this cleft pipe has recently been replaced, that is when Carrefour Orhideea was being built up. The cleft could have appeared due to a shortcoming of the pipe, or because of the wall thickness. The pipe wall might have eroded due to the transportation of black oil, which has a high sulphur level. (L.M., G.M.)