Cement Energy and Environment

r what constitutes growth. It is no longer possible to treat the environment with passive disregard. And it is no longer tenable to pretend that these are concerns only for the other or wealthier nations,' the PM noted. "In fact, the very definition of growth has been enlarged to accommodate environmental and related concerns. There is now general agreement that environment cannot be protected by perpetuating the poverty of developing countries," he said. Courtesy: The Financial Express, New Delhi, July 25, 2011 ENVIRONMEN Rt:GU;...ATOR r Rl= SET UP SOON Recognising the need for a change in the way environmental clearances are granted, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has said the country would soon have a National Environment Appraisal and Monitoring Authority. "We hope to establish an independent regulator - the National Environment Appraisal and Monitoring Authority - soon. This authority could lead to a complete change in the process of granting environmental clearances," Singh said at the valedictory session of the international seminar on 'Global environment and disaster management: Law and society' in New Delhi . Staffed by dedicated professionals, the authority will work on a full-time basis to evolve better and more objective standards of scrutiny. Incidentally, at the same e~ent, Chief Justice of India (CJI) S H Kapadia said that the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) should evolve a regulatory mechanism only for appraisal of projects as the project proponent's report can't be relied on. At present, the MoEF has Expert Appraisal Committees (EAC) which are multi disciplinary sectoral expert committees comprising various subject experts and are constituted for appraisal of sector specific projects. EAC is the recommendatory body. "As far as mining is concerned, the regulatory mechanism should be in charge of pricing also. Mining laws are there but they are flouted at the state level and illegal mining is happening in many states. Excavated minerals should have a price discovery mechanism as there is no machinery to supervise the pricing," Kapadia said. Earlier, he asked the ministry to simplify its green laws, which were at present so complex it took hours for the court to interpret them. Industry had long complained that the complicated procedures were a barrier. Environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan said the CJI's suggestions would be taken up seriously. On the development versus environment debate, Singh said that In the public mind, there has always been a trade-off between economic growth and environmental sustainability. But, this view is changing slowly as more and more people are reviewing their notions of what constitutes growth. It is no longer possible to treat the environment with passive disregard. And it is no longer tenable to pretend that these are concerns only for the other or wealthier nations, the PM said. "In fact, the very definition of growth has been enlarged to accommodate environment– related concerns. There is now a general agreement that environment cannot be protected by perpetuating the poverty of developing countries." Courtesy: The Financial Express, New Delhi, July 25, 2011 EN\/JRONME~ A_ p.r 0 JNTING & GR~EN GOt The government has set up an expert group to provide a road map for Green National Accounting system to evaluate the impact of economic growth on environment. ET explains the meaning and importance of GNA: What is environmental accounting? It is a method to measure the consumption of the environmenUnatural resources as a country strives for higher growth. The future cost of depletion of natural resources and other damages caused to the environment are excluded from conventional output measures such as the Gross Domestic Product. Environmental accounting builds on the conventional accounting methodology to reflect the costs of economic development. Why is it important? Most production tends to use up natural resources directly or indirectly and also tends to impact the environment in some way or other mostly through pollution. It is widely- acknowledged amongst 39