December 12, 2008	Friday	Zilhaj 13, 1429

KARACHI, Dec 11: The Sindh Environmental Protection Agency has decided to hold a combined public hearing for environmental clearance of prospective windmill cases on the Gharo-Keti Bander-Hyderabad Natural Wind Corridor, it has been reliably learnt.

Sites for about 22 windmill projects with an initial generation capacity of 50MW each have been marked on the wind corridor under the Alternative Energy Development Board’s initiatives.

Entrepreneurs are legally required to submit initial environment examination (IEE) or environmental impact assessment (EIA) reports to Sepa for the issuance of a no-objection certificate before initiating work on any project.

However, till late Sepa officials did not know about the exact parameters for assessing the wind turbine projects, as the concept of such mills is still new to many stakeholders although it was floated in the country about six years ago.

While Sepa was in the process of acquiring guidelines from the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency on the issue of clearance and certification of windmill projects, a few companies started the work on the ground and also succeeded in putting up a couple of wind turbines on the corridor. One of the firms has planned to make its first five turbines operational within a month.

According to entrepreneurs, the sale price of wind energy in Pakistan was better than many other countries.

Talking to Dawn, Sindh Minister for Environment and Alternative Energy Askari Taqvi said that since the federal government had already extended the required guidelines to Sepa and also there was a need to expedite the windmill projects, the department had decided to hold a public hearing of all environmental reports, whether related to the IEE or the EIA, received from the wind energy companies at once.

One of the companies had decided to make its mills operational by the middle of January 2009, he said, adding that Sepa was also contemplating exploiting the occasion and holding the public hearing for environmental clearance at the site of the mills in question at a time close to the formal inauguration of the wind turbines.

According to the minister, the issuance of NOCs to windmills is considered as a matter of formality and it would depend on the stakeholders during the public hearing as to how they wanted to run the windmills.

It has also been learnt that the AEDB has also signed a memorandum of understanding with a public sector party for the development of a 50MW wind power project at Hawkesbay, while on the other hand one of the companies has also applied for carbon credits as it understands that by virtue of the mills to be commissioned it will replace emission of about 10,000-ton carbon dioxide every year.

Generally, there are objections to windmills for their adverse aesthetic impact on the visual landscape, noise from the spinning rotors and their potential to harm birds.

According to the reports, prepared by a couple of project proponents and received at Sepa, environmental impacts including the issues of loss of habitat and resettlement, harm to vegetation, bird protection, threat to marine life and water reservoirs, agricultural productivity, waste generated by plants or relevant staff, air pollution during the construction of the plants, impact on the telecommunications sector, noise sensitivity in the areas, shadow of the wind turbines and visual impacts need to be assessed.