Too Hot to Handle – Storage of Toxic Industrial Waste
India has tightened guidelines for storage of toxic industrial waste. But is it enough?
A fire at Ankleshwar forced India to rethink how it handles hazardous waste. Drums carrying dangerous industrial sludge flew amid leaping flames and burst in the air at a waste storage at the industrial complex in Bharuch district of Gujarat on April 3 last year. Ash fell all around. People in nearby villages were told to evacuate; many suffered coughing, headache, nausea and burning sensation in the nose and throat.
It could have turned into a disaster worse than the Bhopal gas tragedy but for the change in the wind direction away from other factories (see ‘Bhopal to Bharuch’, Down To Earth, April 30, 2008). Continue reading »
Filed under Environment, Pollution, Travel | Tags: Bharuch, Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Gujarat, Hazardous Waste, Hazardous Waste Regulations, India, Ministry Of Environment And Forests (MOEF), Toxic Wastes, Waste Disposal, Waste Incineration, Waste Management, Waste To Energy, Waste Treatment | Comment (0)Ganga’s moment
New studies, committees and a tag of national river. Will it help?
The government has decided to declare the Ganga a national river, following campaigns from several quarters to preserve its cultural and religious significance. A High Powered Ganga River Basin Authority, to be chaired by the prime minister, will be set up as an empowered planning, implementing and monitoring authority for the river. The Ministry of Environment and Forests, or MOEF, has decided to conduct a basin-wide pilot study of the ecological impact of hydel projects coming up on the Ganga.
The events were set into motion by a letter written by Congress chairperson Sonia Gandhi to Union water resources minister Saifuddin Soz in mid-August. The letter was forwarded to MOEF, which called a n inter-ministerial meeting in September. The decision to carry out the pilot study was taken at the meeting attended by representatives of water resources and power ministries, Central Water Commission, Central Electricity Authority and the National Thermal Power Corporation (ntpc). Continue reading »
Filed under Environment, India, Rivers, Travel | Tags: * Uttaranchal (Uttarakhand), Bhagirathi, Dams, Ganga, Hydroelectricity, Hydrology, Ministry Of Environment And Forests (MOEF), National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), River Basin, Rivers, Water Resources | Comment (0)Pollution Not under Control
Parliamentary report calls for saving the Central pollution control body
It’s official. The Central Pollution Control Board (cpcb), the nodal body for regulating environmental norms in India, is being “reduced to a near-defunct body”. The parliamentary standing committee on science and technology, environment and forests for the first time took note of the problems ailing cpcb in a report tabled in Parliament on October 21.
Issues like unqualified members and lack of enforcement power have long plagued the central and state pollution control boards (spcbs), a fact acknowledged by the board heads. The committee also noticed that the scarcity of technical staff was affecting the functioning of the boards.
“The key posts in cpcb and spcbs are being manned by officers of the Indian Administrative Service or bureaucrats who neither possess the necessary capabilities and expertise in properly managing and planning pollution control activities nor have enough time to pay attention to these activities,”
the report said. Continue reading »
Filed under India, News, Pollution | Tags: Air Quality Monitoring, Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Environment, India, Ministry Of Environment And Forests (MOEF), Parliament, Pollution Control, Water Quality | Comment (0)MOEF Defination of Waste, Material etc. Skewed
The terms ‘waste‘ and ‘material‘ are synonymous in the draft hazardous material rules of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (moef). The rules have been criticized for violating norms of the Basel Convention – an international treaty on cleaner production, minimization of hazardous waste and control on its movement—to which India is a signatory.
“The rather unusual use of two similar meaning yet different terms—waste and material—is bound to lead to enormous confusion,’ note D B Boralkar and Claude Alvares, members of the Supreme Court Monitoring Committee on Hazardous Wastes and say that the state pollution control boards won’t be able to deal with the confusion. Continue reading »
Filed under Environment, Pollution, Save environment | Tags: * Government Of India (GOI), Hazardous Industry, Hazardous Products, India, Legislation, Ministry Of Environment And Forests (MOEF), Supreme Court, Toxic Wastes, Waste Disposal | Comment (0)