(a) whether the Government has issued a set of revised guidelines on environmental clearances for industries, based on the quantum of pollution caused by them;
(b) if so, the details thereof including the methodology used by the Government to develop the new pollution index and various stakeholders and expert organisations that were consulted;
(c) whether the Government would consider reviewing the new norms to issue licences to the industries, particularly for industries that has the potential to cause great damage to the environment such as tanneries and mandate an annual environmental review; and
(d) if so, the details thereof? |
| ANSWER |
MINISTER OF STATE (INDEPENDENT CHARGE) FOR ENVIRONMENT, FOREST AND CLIMATE CHANGE
(SHRI ANIL MADHAV DAVE)
(a) & (b) No Sir. However, industries were recategorised based on their pollution potential scores. For the recategorisation, a working group comprising of Members from CPCB and SPCBs representing the States of Andhra Pradesh, Punjab, Tamilnadu, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra was constituted.
Based on relative Pollution potential scores, industries are categorized as Red category (=60), Orange category (41-59), Green category (21-40) and White category (=20). This newly introduced ‘White category’ contains 36 non-polluting industrial sectors. There shall be no requirement of obtaining the “Consent to Operate’’ for White category of industries and intimation to the concerned SPCB / PCC shall suffice. This waiver of ‘consent to operate’ will facilitate establishment of such white category units.
(c) & (d) The pollution potential score of the tanneries is more than 60 and hence are categorized as Red. This sector comes under the 17 categories of highly polluting industries. The Ministry follows the process of appraisal and monitoring of such projects for grant of Environmental Clearance rigorously as per the relevant rules and regulations. |
|
|
