KARACHI: Pointing out serious deficiencies in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) report of a high-rise building proposed to be built in Clifton, stakeholders at a public hearing held recently at a local hotel questioned the Sindh Environmental Protection Agency (Sepa) over processing multistorey residential-cum-commercial projects when the Supreme Court had imposed a complete ban on the constructions of buildings beyond ground-plus-two floors in the city.

The environmental watchdog was also asked to stop approving more high-rise projects unless it made available studies assessing the cumulative effects a particular area would experience in the wake of new projects.

The hearing organised by Sepa pertained to Dynasty, a ground-plus-22-floor building proposed in Block-9 of Clifton by Premier Enterprise. The EIA study of the project was conducted by Environmental Consultancy Services (ECS).

Giving a presentation on the project’s EIA report, Shahid Lutfi representing the ECS said it’s a commercial-cum-residential venture, which wouldn’t only help meet growing housing requirements, but would also generate business opportunities.

Sepa asked not to approve multistorey projects unless thorough studies conducted

The proposed project, he said, would include shops, apartments, service and recreational area and sufficient space for car and motorcycle parking.

According to him, the water demand during operational and occupancy period will be around 34,000 gallons per day and the primary water supply source would be the KWSB. However, water tanker service would be utilised during the building’s construction.

“A reverse osmosis (RO) plant has been planned, having the capacity of 10,000 gallons per day, which would be increased to meet water demand, if KWSB fails to provide water in the operational phase,” he said, adding that the project had all safety features and posed no significant environmental effects.

As the floor was opened for question-and-answer session, a number of concerns were raised from the audience, with some describing the EIA report as “incomplete” and “flawed”. The report, it was said, didn’t highlight the adverse impacts the project would likely cause and lacked important data on waste disposal, especially the hazardous refuse to be generated by the RO plant.

A shared reservation was about water availability for the project given the acute water shortages the city presently faced. There were little hopes for the crisis to end soon as water from the upcoming bulk supply project (K-IV) would likely be diverted towards DHA City and Bahria Town, participants said.

They also criticised the project proponent’s strategy to fulfil water demand during the construction phase through water tanker service and feared that traffic situation would likely worsen in the project area, already facing serious traffic management issues.

On approvals the project proponent needed to take from relevant departments, Dr Raza Gardezi said that the no-objection certificates (NOCs) obtained from the KWSB and K-Electric were not “actually NOCs” as the concerned utilities hadn’t given assurance for water and electricity supplies to the project.

“As per a KWSB notification released this year, the KWSB has cancelled all its NOCs issued after October 25, 2011. Second, the NOC of KWSB attached with the report clearly states that KWSB water and sewerage network doesn’t exist in the specific area.

“Thirdly, the NOC the proponent has obtained from K-Electric states that the applicant will not ask for the provision of supply in case the KE is unable to provide. There is no NOC to show how 9.5MMBTU gas requirement would be met,” Dr Gardezi pointed out, as he read out passages from the EIA report and pointed out that the data was “incomplete, flawed and contradictory”.

He also questioned how 27,000 gallons of waste water to be generated daily would be disposed of in the absence of KWSB connection.

Engineer Pervaiz Sadiq asked the EIA consultants to see how environmental concerns could be looked into if K-Electric didn’t provide electricity to the project, which then had to rely completely on generators that would operate round the clock.

Replying to some of these concerns, Mr Lutfi and his team referred to a residential project in Gulshan-i-Iqbal which, they said, was effectively running on an RO plant and said that the parking space available in the project was sufficient.

Regarding the court ban on high-rises, deputy director Sepa Imran Sabir said that it had not barred the department from taking up projects.

Published in Dawn, October 8th, 2017