Jaypee’s power plant project in Sonbhadra hits green hurdle

UP’s Principal Secretary (Forests) has been informed about the decision,taken by the standing committee of the National Board of Wild Life (NBWL),on the basis of an adverse report from Wildlife Institute of India,Dehradun. Union Minister of State (Independent Charge),MoEF,Jayanti Natarajan heads the standing committee.

The proposed integrated project of JAL includes 4X60 MW captive thermal power plants with 1 million tonne per annum cement grinding unit and 1 million tonne per annum coal washery,which are reportedly situated within 1.5 km from the boundary of Kaimur Wildlife Sanctuary.

It was to come up in the bounded area of erstwhile Churk cement factory of the UP State Cement Corporation Limited (UPSCCL),which became sick and was sold to JAL in 2006.

JAL applied for environment clearance from MoEF in 2011. Since the site was close to Kaimur Wildlife Sanctuary,the MoEF referred the matter to NBWL. Incidentally,neither the sanctuary nor the Forest Conservation Act existed when the original cement factory was set up in 1952-53.

NBWL dispatched an eight-member team,consisting of experts from the Wildlife Institute of India (WII),Dehradun and its senior forest officials,which conducted a spot inspection between July 17 and 19,2011. Its members included professors Asha Rajvanshi and Dhananjai Mohan,both from WII; Chief Conservator of Forests in MoEF Y K Singh Chauhan; Deputy Director in MoEF Amit Kumar Gupta,DFO of Kaimur Wildlife Sanctuary Ashok Dixit,DFO of Sonbhadra Shiv Pal Singh and two senior members of JAL,including its President (Corporate Affairs) V S Bajaj and Executive President Ajay Sharma.

During the site visit,the team found that JAL had made certain claims which were incorrect. JAL had claimed there was no forest within 10 km radius of the plant. However,the team found that the boundary of Raunp forest block is separated from the boundary of the project just by a road with a distance of hardly seven metres.

JAL had also reportedly claimed that there are no sanctuaries or national parks within 25 km radius of the plant site. But the team found that the nearest boundary of Kaimur Wildlife Sanctuary was approximately 1.5 km from the boundary of the project site. Also,JAL had submitted an incomplete faunal checklist generated through primary survey and many important species were missing.

The team reported that the proposed plant will have noisy equipment such as crushers,belt conveyors,fans,pumps,milling plant,compressors,boiler,turbine,etc.,which will affect the local habitat and the flora and fauna of Kaimur Wildlife Sanctuary. Further,the proposed unit will also emit gases along with particulate matter from two stacks,which will affect flora and fauna.

The plant proposed to draw water from the upstream of a nearby river,which will have a grave ecological impact and negatively affect the availability of drinking water,the report said .

At the meeting of the standing committee of NWBL,which was held on June 13,2012,it was reportedly pointed out there had been apparent violation of the Forest Conservation Act,the Environment (Protection) Act,and the Wild Life Protection Act as work on the plant had been started without requisite permission from the standing committee and without obtaining environmental clearance.