Drive for power plants dents ecology in Telangana, Andhra Pradesh

Hyderabad: The United Nations has decided to address the concerns of unsustainable exploitation and consumption of natural resources through this year’s theme of ‘Seven billion dreams. One planet. Consume with care’, for World Environment Day on June 5.

However, sustainable consumption of natural resources does not seem to be in the books of the AP and Telangana state governments. An example is the energy sector. As per latest government reports, AP and TS have power plants with an installed capacity of 18,531MW, of which nearly 13,000 MW is dependent on fossil fuels, a majority of which (9,583 MW) is coal based. Renewable energy source-based plants account for less than 1 per cent of the total installed capacity – 1,530 MW – apart from which 3,734 MW is hydroelectric based. This shows the apathy of both states in working toward clean fuel through renewable sources so as to decrease consumption of coal.There are plans in the pipeline for more than 60 thermal power plants in both states. The existing power plants consume more than 1.5 lakh tonne of coal per day and this would increase manifold as about 30 of the 60 planned thermal power plants are of 1,000MW capacity and more.

A single plant of 500MW capacity approximately consumes about 7,000 tonne of coal. Thermal power plants do not just consume coal but also millions of litres of water everyday and also result in destruction of huge tracts of forests. Similarly, forests are being lost to illegal wood smuggling, land acquisitions, mining and monoculture, sand is mined illegally to satisfy the needs in cities, fish is being pushed to extinction due to over-fishing, medicinal plants are being exploited without efforts from the Forest department to replenish them and groundwater is being pumped out without regulation due to poor irrigation networks. Many such examples exist of natural resources being unmindfully exploited in both states.