NEW DELHI: The Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority on Friday said the final call on relaxing the ban on use of diesel generators (DG) in certain areas, d industries in Haryana and Uttar Pradesh will be taken on Oct 22. Under the Graded Response Action Plan (GRAP), the EPCA banned the use of diesel generators in Delhi and NCR cities of Gurgaon, Ghaziabad, Noida, Greater Noida, Faridabad, Sonepat, Panipat and Bahadurgarh from Tuesday.
At a meeting on Friday, officials from Haryana told EPCA that there are several areas that do not have power connections due to inadequate electrical infrastructure and transmission constraints. Even though the ban has been enforced in Haryana, such areas and industries are not being penalised for using diesel generators. They said in Gurgaon there are 5,540 diesel generators, 1,833 in Faridabad, 753 in Sonepat, 74 in Panipat and 17 in Bahadurgarh.
Uttar Pradesh officials told EPCA that power outages in Ghaziabad, Noida and Greater Noida are “minimal”. However, EPCA said there have been a number of complaints of heavy power cuts. The EPCA has also said that Haryana’s two coal-based power plants in NCR will be shut down if these failed to comply with emission norms by next year. According to the Centre for Science and Environment estimates, these norms can help cut particulate matter emission by about 35%, oxides of nitrogen emission by about 70%, and SO2 emission by more than 85% by 2026-27.
With agency inputs