ZOUK MIKAEL, Lebanon — In a small garage in Zouk Mikael, a coastal town 20 kilometers (14 miles) north of Beirut, Hamid Dabkey looks at the decrepit exterior of the town’s power station, just 200 meters (650 feet) away. Dabkey’s garage is located on the ground floor of a six-story residential complex. A number of other apartment blocks line the road. Grey plumes of smoke rise from the plant’s two red and white chimneys, snaking between buildings, pushed inland by a breeze coming off the Mediterranean.
“Around once a month, the smoke becomes very thick,” Dabkey told Al-Monitor, “and there is this loud noise like an airplane. It sounds like the entire place is breaking.”