MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government's 3,000 MW Karjat Pumped Storage Project (PSP) in the Saidongar area of Karjat taluka in Raigad district has come under fire from environment activists over plans to cut more than 50,000 trees and shrubs, raising concerns about the impact on the local ecology.
The state government has allocated the project to Torrent Power. Designed to supply 6,570 million units of clean electricity, the project requires 233 hectares of forest land and 144 hectares of non-forest land.
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis defended the project, describing it as environmentally sustainable. He said it was 16 km from the Bhimashankar forest area and 20 km from the Bhimashankar temple.
“Maharashtra has become a pump storage hub, and this current project is one of them. The 3000 MW of electricity will be generated in this project. It will be clean energy. The land acquisition is needed to store the water like a reservoir,” Fadnavis said.
“The company that is developing a power project at Karjat has given three times more land to the forest department, where the company will plant 30,000 trees at its own cost. Besides, 60,000 trees at the same site will be planted. So, 90,000 trees will be planted on this side and around the sites of the project. So, the environment and ecology balance will be maintained,” he added.
The chief minister said that if they did not complete this 3000 MW clean power plant, then they would have to buy 3000 MW of thermal power. “And, to mitigate the pollution through this 3000 MW thermal power, we have to plant 28 crore full-grown trees. Therefore, it is better to continue with a clean energy project,” Fadnavis said.
Villagers in Karjat alleged that the project had been pushed through without the consent of residents and their respective gram panchayats.
We are against this project. We do not want our ecology to be destroyed by cutting down thousands of trees. This area is part of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s brave history, and the government can destroy it. We do not want the development at the cost of nature, the villagers said.
Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aditya Thackeray visited the project site and met villagers affected by the project. He assured them of help and support if they wanted to oppose what he described as an anti-environment project.
Thackeray said they wanted development, but not at the cost of destroying nature, which he said would cause greater harm amid climate change.