No more dual compliance of EC,CTE to set up new industries

The MINISTRY of Environment Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) has accepted the long-pending demand of the industry to remove dual compliance of Environment Clearance (EC) and Consent to Establish (CTE) for setting up of new industries. The Ministry made this decision after consulting with the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) recently. Now, non-polluting white category industries (NPI) which have pollution index score upto 20, will not be required to take CTE or Consent to Operate (CTO) at all. The industries who have taken EC will not be required to take CTE once again.

 

This will not only reduce the compliance burden, but also prevent duplication of approvals. Notifications to this effect have been issued by MoEFCC under the Air (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1981 and Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974. The notification effectively integrates these two approvals and a Standard of Procedure (SoP) has also been issued in this regard to take into account the issues considered during CTE process, in the EC itself.

 

State Pollution Control Boards (SPCB) will be consulted during EC process. Further, the CTE fee shall be required to be paid by the industry, so that there is no loss of revenue to the States. In the notification, MoEFCC also mentioned about the list of 39 white category of industrial sectors -- Medical oxygen units; Assembly units of air coolers, air conditioners, repairing and servicing; Assembly of bicycles, baby carriages and other small non motorising vehicles; blending and packing of tea units; Compressed oxygen gas from crude liquid oxygen units; Electric bulb and CFL manufacturing by assembling only; Engineering and fabrication units; Flavoured betel nuts production or grinding units; Fly ash bricks manufacturing units; Handloom and carpet weaving (without dying and bleaching); Leather cutting and stitching units; Repairing of electric motors and generators; Scientific and mathematical instrument manufacturing units; Solar power generation through solar photovoltaic cell, wind power and mini hydel power (less than 25 MW); Surgical and medical products assembling units; Household Bio-digesters or gobar gas units etc. will be exempted to get dual compliance of EC and CTE for setting up of new industries.