For green nod, make projects tsunami-proof

India has become the first country in the world to incorporate Tsunami proofing for environmental clearances of major projects, after titanic Tsunami devastated key projects in Japan this month.

Updated on: Mar 17, 2011, 23:00:56 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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India has become the first country in the world to incorporate Tsunami proofing for environmental clearances of major projects, after titanic Tsunami devastated key projects in Japan this month.

Environment minister Jairam Ramesh on Thursday asked the Expert Appraisal Committees, mandated to given environment clearances to projects, to include tsunami related risks in the terms of reference for Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) reports for four sectors --- nuclear power, infrastructure, thermal power and industry.

The EIA are supposed to be scientific studies on environmental viability of the projects, on whose basis the EAC takes the final call. While earthquake impact is considered in the EIAs, Tsunami is not.

Considering the large number of projects being proposed on India's 5,400 km long coastline such as refineries, oil storage depots, power plants, the ministry wants Tsunami proofing to be part of detailed project reports. And, therefore, it has been included in the EIAs.

To find out whether the existing projects in the coastal areas can withstand impact of Tsunami of intensity similar to the one that hit Japan last week and if not, what additional safeguards are required, the ministry has constituted an expert group under former bureaucrat A M Muthunayagam.

The group will submit its report to the ministry in three months.

In addition to it, the group will examine a suggestion made by Rajya Sabha member and agriculture scientist M S Swaminathan on whether to declare areas around nuclear power plants in coastal areas as Critically Vulnerable Coastal Areas.

If this is done, it would mean there would be tough restrictions on any sort of development around nuclear plants and developing bio-shields of mangroves and non-mangroves species will become a must.

"There is a concern over safety of nuclear plants located in Kalpakkam and Kudangulam in Tamil Nadu makes me feel that in addition to other steps we need to promote bio-sheilds," Swaminathan, said in a letter to Ramesh.

A study on impact of 2004 Tsunami on Indian coasts by V Senthil, director National Coastal Zone Management Authority had shown that the damage to wildlife and habitation in coastal areas having good mangroves cultivation was less than in mangrove deficient areas.

"My studied showed that the mangroves protected Gulf of Manner, Nagapattnam and parts of Andaman and Nicobar islands from the 2004 Tsunami," he told HT.

Swaminathan said the mangroves acted as a "speed-breakers" in 2004, reducing the damage caused.

Ramesh also said that Rs 1,200 crore has been sanctioned for conducting a hazard line mapping of coastal areas for seawater impact caused by cyclone or tsunami or climate change.

"This is being done by the Survey of India and it will be completed in 24 months time," he said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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