Committee to address smog issue

Environment dept sends cases of 170 brick kilns to tribunal

FAISALABAD:

The district environment protection department has sent 170 cases to a provincial tribunal against owners of brick kilns involved in violation of laws, while also constituting a committee to deal with the forthcoming smog season. The committee includes five members from different related departments.

Sources said that in the light of directives of the Supreme Court, 88 Bull’s trench kilns were converted to the zigzag technology by the June 30 deadline.

The government had notified three zones in terms of discharge of emissions and effluents polluting the air. Faisalabad, Shekhupura, Lahore, Sialkot, Gujranwala and Gujrat were declared red zone; Chiniot, Bhakkar and Layyah yellow and Attock, Chakwal, Mianwali, Rawalpindi and Jhelum green zone, with deadlines of June 30, September 30 and December 31 respectively for adopting the zigzag technology. The districts in red zone could not meet the deadline owing to outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic and the process was delayed.

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Environment Department Deputy Director Farhat Abbas Kamoka told The Express Tribune that while launching the anti-smog measures, serious violations by owners of brick kilns were noted, like burning of substandard fuel, plastic waste, used coal, rubber, leather products, discarded cloth, crop remnants, poultry waste and rice husk.

The official said there were 459 brick kilns across the Faisalabad district that had earlier been enjoying lenience because of a weak government machinery and lighter implementation of environmental laws in the country. He said that after assuming charge on January 1, he had forwarded 170 cases of violations committed by brick kilns, while only six cases had been submitted in 2019.

He said the department had also initiated proceedings against plastic manufactures, sellers and buyers in compliance with a ban imposed by the Supreme Court.

A compliance report in this regard will be submitted to the court by September 9.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 18^th, 2020.