MULTAN, Jan 17: A textile mills has lodged a complaint with the Muzaffargarh district government that emissions from a thermal power station are damaging his products to the extent that foreign buyers have refused to lift them.

Sources in the Muzaffargarh district government stated that Mahmood Textile Mills had lodged a complaint on Dec 26 that the emissions from the Thermal Power Station of the Northern Power Generation Company, a subsidiary of Wapda, had been damaging the quality of yarn meant for exports.

At this, the environment protection department issued a show cause notice on Dec 27 to the power station management to explain its position within seven days and warned it of a stern action under the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act, 1997.

In its reply on Jan 2, the management denied that furnace oil was being used for power generation. It claimed that it was using natural gas and the emissions were rather negligible.

It maintained that the guidelines laid down by the World Bank and National Environmental Quality Standards were being strictly observed.

It claimed that IUCN and Wapda were jointly assessing the environmental impact of emissions on quarterly basis and found no adverse effect on soil, flora and fauna and human life in the area.

Rejecting the textile mills assertion, the power station management said the mill was situated at a distance from it and therefore there arose no question of its products being damaged by the emissions. Instead, it pointed out that dust, dirt and smoke raised by heavy vehicular traffic was a major cause of spoiling the mills environment.

"People's low standards of living, unhygienic lifestyle and poverty are more responsible for the proliferation of diseases (than the emissions from power station)," the reply concluded.

However, the district officer (environment) declared the reply unsatisfactory and referred the matter to the district government to constitute a committee to look into the matter.

DO Mian Khalid Mahmood told Dawn that the power station burnt some 5,000 tons of furnace oil daily that emitted 3 per cent sulphur in the air.

He said it neither has any treatment plant nor Flue Gas Dissolve System.

He said initial findings of the EPD had confirmed that the emissions were causing great environmental pollution in the area. However, the department was carrying out further tests to find out the exact situation.

He said the Muzaffargarh district government had also formed a committee that would soon take up the pollution matter.