ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Environment Protection Agency (Pak-EPA) told a parliamentary committee on Wednesday that the sulphur content in diesel continues to be a major environmental concern.

“The sulphur content in diesel is 1pc plus, which it should be less than 0.05pc according to international standards,” Pak-EPA Director General Farzana Altaf Shah said at a meeting of the Senate Standing Committee on Climate Change.

Despite meeting with the concerned government departments, including the Ministry of Petroleum, she said there is no timeline for how soon diesel quality can be improved.

Senate climate change body met to discuss measures taken to control industry, vehicular emissions

The committee met to discuss measures taken to control emissions from industries and vehicles.

Senators believed that there were no checks on pollutants emitted into the atmosphere; they were told that vehicular emissions, mostly from diesel-run public transport, contribute the most — as high as 43pc — to the smog that covers Punjab every winter.

Ms Shah told the meeting that refiners blending diesel to improve its quality are not following international standards, and are doing more harm to the environment than good.

Pakistan State Oil (PSO) General Manager Government Affairs Khawar Abbas Jilani conceded that Euro II diesel in Pakistan is far inferior to international standards.

He said that Pakistan switched to Euro II compliant high speed diesel after 2017. Prior to this, high speed diesel had 5,000 parts per million of sulphur, which was reduced to 500ppm post-2017.

“We are aspiring for Euro V high speed diesel. We are in contact with the Kuwait Petroleum Company, which has informed us that from 2020 onwards it will stop producing the inferior Euro II high speed diesel. Once introduced in Pakistan, the sulphur content will drop to hardly 10ppm,” Mr Jilani said.

Shell’s Head of Corporate Affairs Imran Qureshi told senators that diesel will soon be transported through pipelines, which will halve the number of oil tankers — currently around 15,000.

The committee also took up air pollution caused by 185 industrial units in Islamabad and Kahuta, most of them steel mills and marble factories.

According to the Pak-EPA, 63 brick kilns were stopped from operating, except for two units that obtained stay orders from the Islamabad High Courts.

Senators argued that the ambient air quality over Islamabad has continued to worsen, and attributed emissions of hazardous smoke to industrial units, especially steel mills, in I-9 and I-10.

Ministry of Climate Change Secretary Nasir Jamy told the committee that emissions from steel mills were being controlled through continuous checks by the Pak-EPA.

“Until a few years ago, all the industrial units were emitting five tons of raw carbon into the air. In the last two to three years, these units have been directed to install scrubbers, which now absorb raw carbon into bags of filters,” he said.

The senators, however, were not entirely convinced by some of these measures and believed the concerned departments were misleading members with outdated presentations.

Published in Dawn, May 23rd, 2019