Question : PROJECTS PENDING FOR ENVIRONMENTAL CLEARANCE

(a) whether a large number of public and private coal mining and developmental projects of various States are pending for environment and forest clearance;

(b) if so, the details thereof, project and State-wise;

(c) whether the Government has taken any initiative to grant environment and forest clearance for these projects in a time bound manner to prevent cost overruns and delay in completion of the projects;

(d) if so, the details thereof; and

(e) the action taken by the Government in this regard?

MINISTER OF STATE (INDEPENDENT CHARGE) FOR ENVIRONMENT, FORESTS AND CLIMATE CHANGE (SHRI PRAKASH JAVADEKAR)

(a) & (b): The State/UT-wise details of pending proposals in this Ministry of various sectors for consideration for grant of environment and forest Clearance are at Annexure-A and Annexure-B respectively.

(c) to (e): The project proposals for environment clearance are considered as per the provisions of the Environmental Impact Assessment Notification, 2006, as amended from time to time, which inter alia provides timelines for various stages of consideration. As regards the proposals requiring forest clearance, the same are considered as per the provisions of the Forest (Conservation) Rules, 2003 as amended in 2014, which inter alia stipulate the time-lines for processing of forest clearance proposals.

For expediting the process of grant of environmental clearance, the Ministry has taken various steps which include: (i) regular and longer duration meetings of Expert Appraisal Committees for consideration of projects in different sectors, (ii) regular monitoring of status of pending projects, (iii) on-line submission of application for grant of Environment Clearance/Term of Reference, (iv) constitution of State / Union Territory Level Environment Impact Assessment Authorities (SEIAAs) in 26 States/ UTs to deal with the Category ‘B’ projects, (v) guidelines for Categorization of B Category projects into B1 & B2 Category etc.

The following measures have been taken to facilitate the forest clearance process:

i. A simplified format for obtaining Forest Clearance for processing in forest land has been stipulated.

ii. Four more new Regional Offices have been opened up at Dehradun, Ranchi, Nagpur and Chennai.

iii. On-line portal for filing and tracking the status of forest clearance applications under Forest (Conservation) Act, 1980 is being developed.