Govt for 100 per cent utilisation of fly ash

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Bhubaneswar: Expressing concern over generation of huge amount of fly ash from various industries, the state government has asked the fly ash generating companies to ensure 100 per cent utilisation of the ash in 2018-19.
The state has achieved 81 per cent utilisation of the fly ash generated during the year 2017-18. To achieve 100 per cent target, Chief Secretary A P Padhi Thursday asked the companies to prepare the actual ground level plan for accomplishing 100 per cent utilisation of the generated ash during the year 2018-19.
Companies were asked to prioritise the matter for preventing any environmental hazard. The chief secretary instructed the law enforcement agencies and departments to deal with the violations stringently in interest of the safety and health of the people.
Development Commissioner R Balakrishnan said 100 per cent utilisation of the dangerous fly ash is obligatory on part of the companies. Apart from traditional ways of utilisation, the companies must identify new avenues for utilisation of greater amount of the ash.
Further, the companies were directed to display fly ash stock in their websites. They were directed to provide transport free fly ash for Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) and other durable asset creation projects of the government within 300 km of distance from their companies.
Replying to a media query after the meeting, Member Secretary of State Pollution Control Board Debidatta Biswal said, “We are regularly monitoring 40 thermal power plants of more than 10MW capacity. Fly ash utilisation in the state is at an increasing rate.”
In the year 2016-17, around 32 million tonne of ash was generated by different thermal power companies against which around 68 per cent was utilised. This was higher than the national utilisation average of 63 per cent. In the year 2017-18, the utilisation has gone up to around 81 per cent against almost the same amount of generation (32 million tonne), he said.