Act And Policies - 3 | Environment for UPSC CSE PDF Download

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The Centre has extended the relaxation of green norms in Left Wing Extremism (LWE) affected areas in the country till December 2018. The central government had in May 2011 granted relaxations under section 2 of the Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980, to help expedite the creation of public utility infrastructure in 60 LWE affected districts identified by the planning commission for implementation of the integrated Action Plan.

Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016
62 million tonnes of waste is generated annually in the country at present, out of which 5.6 million tonnes is plastic waste, 0.17 million tonnes is biomedical waste, hazardous waste generation is 7.90 million tonnes per annum and 15 lakh tonne is e-waste. The per capita waste generation in Indian cities ranges from 200 grams to 600 grams per day. 43 million TPA is collected, 11.9 million is treated and 31 million is dumped in landfill sites, which means that only about 75-80% of the municipal waste gets collected and only 22-28 % of this waste is processed and treated. “Waste generation will increase from 62 million tonnes to about 165 million tonnes in 2030”.
Scientific disposal of solid waste through segregation, collection and treatment and disposal in an environmentally sound manner minimises the adverse impact on the environment. The local authorities are responsible for the development of infrastructure for collection, storage, segregation, transportation, processing and disposal of MSW.
The Rules are now applicable beyond Municipal areas and extend to urban agglomerations, census towns, notified industrial townships, areas under the control of Indian Railways, airports, airbase, Port and harbour, defence establishments, special economic zones, State and Central government organizations, places of pilgrims, religious & historical importance.
The source segregation of waste has been mandated to channelize the waste to wealth by recovery, reuse and recycle.
Integration of waste pickers/ ragpickers and waste dealers/ Kabadiwalas in the formal system should be done by State Governments, and Self Help Group, or any other group to be formed.
No person should throw, burn, or bury the solid waste generated by him, on streets, open public spaces outside his premises, or in the drain, or water bodies.
Generator will have to pay ‘User Fee’ to waste collector and for ‘Spot Fine’ for Littering and Non-segregation.

Time frame
i. setting up solid waste processing facilities by all local bodies having 100000 or more population: within two years
ii. census towns below 100000 population, setting up common or stand-alone sanitary landfills by or for all local bodies having 0.5 million or more population and setting up common or regional sanitary landfills by all local bodies and census towns under 0.5 million population-three years
iii. bio-remediation or capping of old and abandoned dump sites-five years.

Duties of Waste generator
Every waste generator shall segregate and store the waste generated by them in three separate streams namely biodegradable, non-bio-degradable and domestic hazardous wastes in suitable bins and handover segregated wastes to authorized rag-pickers or waste collectors
Event organizer of more than 100 persons shall intimate the local authority, at least three working days in advance. Such person or the organizer of such event shall ensure segregation of waste at source and handing over of segregated waste to waste collector or agency as specified by local authority.
All Resident Welfare and Market Associations, Gated communities and institution with an area >5,000 sq m and all hotels and restaurant shall, within one year from the date of notification of these rules and in partnership with the local authority by the generators as prescribed in these rules, ensure segregation of waste at source, facilitate collection of segregated waste in separate streams, handover recyclable material to either the authorized waste pickers or the authorized recyclers. The biodegradable waste shall be processed, treated and disposed of through composting or bio-methanation within the premises as far as possible. The residual waste shall be given to the waste collectors or agency as directed by the local authority.
The developers of Special Economic Zone, Industrial Estate, Industrial park to earmark at least 5% of the total area of the plot or minimum 5 plots/ sheds for recovery and recycling facility.

Duties of Ministry of Urban Development
MoUD shall formulate National Policy and Strategy on Solid Waste Management including policy on Waste to Energy in consultation with stakeholders within 6 months from the date of notification of these Rules; review of the measures taken by the States and local bodies, undertake training and capacity building of local bodies and other stakeholders; providing technical guidelines and project finance to States, UTs and local bodies on solid waste management to facilitate meeting timelines and standards

Promotion of marketing and utilization of compost
The Department of Fertilisers, Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers shall provide market development assistance on city compost andensure promotion of comarketing of compost with chemical fertilizers in the ratio of 3 to 4 bags: 6 to 7 bags by the fertilizer companies to the extent compost is made available for marketing to the companies. The Ministry of Agriculture shall provide flexibility in Fertiliser Control Order for manufacturing and sale of compost , propagate utlisation of compost on farm land set up laboratories to test quality of compost produced by local authorities or their authorized agencies and issue suitable guidelines for maintaining the quality of compost and ratio of use of compost visa-a-vis chemical fertilizers while applying compost to farmland.

Promotion of waste to energy plant
Ministry of Power shall fix tariff or charges for the power generated from the Waste to Energy plants based on solid waste and ensure compulsory purchase of power generated from such Waste to Energy plants by DISCOMs.
The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy Sources shall facilitate infrastructure creation for Waste to Energy plants and provide appropriate subsidy or incentives for such Waste to Energy plants. All industrial units using fuel and located within 100 km from an solid waste based RDF plant shall make arrangements within six months from the date of notification of these rules to replace at least 5 % of their fuel requirement by RDF so produced.
Non recyclable waste having calorific value of 1500 K/cal/ kg or more shall not be disposed of on landfills and shall only be utilized for generating energy either or through refuse derived fuel or by giving away as feed stock for preparing refuse derived fuel.
Do you know?
The tiger population of Northeast India is genetically different from the rest of the country.

Hazardous Waste Management Rules, 2016
Hazardous waste means any waste, which by reason of characteristics, such as physical, chemical, biological, reactive, toxic, flammable, explosive or corrosive, causes danger to health, or environment. It comprises the waste generated during the manufacturing processes of the commercial products such as industries involved in petroleum refining, production of pharmaceuticals, petroleum, paint, aluminium, electronic products etc. As per the information furnished by CPCB in the year 2015, the total hazardous waste generation in the country is 7.46 million metric tonnes per annum from about 44,000 industries.
Unscientific disposal of hazardous and other waste through burning or incineration leads to emission of toxic fumes comprising of Dioxins & Furans, Mercury, heavy metals, causing air pollution and associated health-related problems. Disposal in water bodies, or in municipal dumps leads to toxic releases due to leaching in land and water entailing into degradation of soil and water quality. The workers employed in such unscientific practices suffer from neurological disorders, skin diseases, genetic defects, cancer etc. Hence, there is a need for systematic management of hazardous and other waste in an environmentally sound manner by way of prevention, minimisation, re-use, recycling, recovery, utilisation including co-processing and safe disposal of waste.
Scientific disposal of hazardous waste through collection, storage, packaging, transportation and treatment, in an environmentally sound manner minimises the adverse impact on human health and on the environment. The hazardous waste can be disposed at captive treatment facility installed by the individual waste generators or at Common Hazardous Waste Treatment, Storage and Disposal Facilities (TSDFs).
For the first time, Rules have been made to distinguish between Hazardous Waste and other wastes. Other wastes include: Waste tyre, paper waste, metal scrap, used electronic items, etc. and are recognized as a resource for recycling and reuse. These resources supplement the industrial processes and reduce the load on the virgin resource of the country.

The salient features
i. The ambit of the Rules has been expanded by including ‘Other Waste’.
ii. Waste Management hierarchy in the sequence of priority of prevention, minimization, reuse, recycling, recovery, co-processing; and safe disposal has been incorporated.
iii. All the forms under the rules for permission, import/ export, filing of annual returns, transportation, etc. have been revised significantly, indicating the stringent approach for management of such hazardous and other wastes with simultaneous simplification of procedure.
iv. The basic necessity of infrastructure to safeguard the health and environment from waste processing industry has been prescribed as Standard Operating Procedure (SOPs), specific to waste type, which has to be complied by the stakeholders and ensured by SPCB/ PCC while granting such authorisation.
v. Procedure has been simplified to merge all the approvals as a single window clearance for setting up of hazardous waste disposal facility and import of other wastes.
vi. Co-processing as preferential mechanism over disposal for use of waste as supplementary resource, or for recovery of energy has been provided.
vii. The approval process for co-processing of hazardous waste to recover energy has been streamlined and put on emission norms basis rather than on trial basis.
viii. The process of import/export of waste under the Rules has been streamlined by simplifying the document based procedure and by revising the list of waste regulated for import/export.
ix. The import of metal scrap, paper waste and various categories of electrical and electronic equipments for re-use purpose has been exempted from the need of obtaining Ministry’s permission.
x. The basic necessity of infrastructure to safeguard the health and environment from waste processing industry has been prescribed as Standard Operating Procedure (SOPs) specific to waste type.
xi. Responsibilities of State Government for environmentally sound management of hazardous and other wastes have been introduced as follows:

• To set up/allot industrial space or sheds for recycling, pre-processing and other utilization of hazardous or other waste
• To register the workers involved in recycling, pre-processing and other utilization activities.
• To form groups of workers to facilitate set ting up such facilities
• To undertake industrial skill development activities and ensure safety and health of workers.

xii. List of processes generating hazardous wastes has been reviewed taking into account technological evolution in the industries.
xiii. List of Waste Constituents with Concentration Limits has been revised as per international standard and drinking water standard.

The following items have been prohibited for import:
a. Waste edible fats and oil of animals, or vegetable origin
b. Household waste
c. Critical Care Medical equipment
d. Tyres for direct re-use purpose
e. Solid Plastic wastes including Pet bottles
f. Waste electrical and electronic assemblies scrap
g. Other chemical wastes especially in solvent form.

xiv. State Government is authorized to prepare integrated plan for effective implementation of these provisions, and have to submit annual report to Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.
xv. State Pollution Control Board is mandated to prepare an annual inventory of the waste generated; waste recycled, recovered, utilised including co-processed; waste re-exported and waste disposed and submit to the Central Pollution Control Board by the 30th day of September every year.

Construction and Demolition Waste Management Rules, 2016
The salient features are:
Applies to everyone who generates construction and demolition waste.

Duties of waste Generators

• Every waste generator shall segregate construction and demolition waste and deposit at collection centre or handover it to the authorised processing facilities
• Shall ensure that there is no littering or deposition so as to prevent obstruction to the traffic or the public or drains.
• Large generators (who generate more than 20 tons or more in one day or 300 tons per project in a month) shall submit waste management plan and get appropriate approvals from the local authority before starting construction or demolition or remodeling work,
• Large generators shall have environment management plan to address the likely environmental issues from construction, demolition, storage, transportation process and disposal / reuse of C & D Waste.
• Large generators shall segregate the waste into four streams such as concrete, soil, steel, wood and plastics, bricks and mortar.

Duties of Service providers and Contractors

• The service providers shall prepare a comprehensive waste management plan for waste generated within their jurisdiction, within six months from the date of notification of these rules,
• Shall remove all construction and demolition waste in consultation with the concerned local authority on their own or through any agency.