Only 1 of 11 thermal plants abide with new emission norms

NEW DELHI: In a reply to Right to Information (RTI) application filed by Sunil Dahiya, an environmentalist at Greenpeace, revealed that only 1 out of the total 11 thermal power plants in the National Capital Region (NCR) is compliant with emission norms that are in line to come into force by December.

According to the estimates by Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), the norms that are to be implemented can help reduce PM emissions by about 35 per cent, nitrogen oxide emissions by about 70 per cent, and SO₂ emissions by more than 85 per cent by 2026-27 against a business-as-usual scenario with no pollution control technologies.

As per the application filed by Dahiya, asking for the status of the compliance of the emission norms, it was found that there were 11 plants traversing Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab, that comes under NCR area and were to implement the FGD technology by December 2019. Only one plant of the 11, the Mahatma Gandhi Thermal Power Station in Haryana was found compliant with the new norms.

The other 10 plants were in various stages of implementation. On this Dahiya said, “It needs nearly 18-24 months for the plants to be compliant with the new norms, However, the documents show that except for one plant, most are in the early stages of bidding or implementation”.