Finance Minister K.M.

Environmentalists have welcomed the government’s tax hike on big cars and SUVs, claiming this will help reduce toxic emissions. But they warn that the government has taken no steps to curb the use of subsidised diesel in private diesel cars.

Anumita Roychowdhury, executive director, research and advocacy, Centre for Science and Environment, warned that urgent steps must be taken to discourage “diesel consumption as also to reduce toxic emissions”, especially since dieselisation is rapidly growing in the small and medium segments which have been left untouched.

“It appears that the municipality has joined hands with textile processing and tannery industries, which have been causing irreversible damage to the environment by dumping untreated, toxic effluents, many residents in the town say.

The farmers have been fighting for years to protect River Cauvery and its tributaries from the textile processing and the tannery units.

City-based environmental activists has filed a complaint against the timber mafia before the Supreme Court Empowered Committee (CEC) on Monday. They are seeking a ban on the indiscriminate felling of trees like Neem that are in the exempted list. In their petition, the activists asked the CEC to direct the state-level committee not to issue licences to saw mills.

KOCHI: It was part of the efforts to regulate the increasing number of highrise buildings that the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) issued a fresh set of guidelines towards getting environmental clearance for high-rise buildings in three states, including Kerala.

According to the new set of rules, any high-rise building which needs clearance from the municipality or local bodies should be situated in proximity to a fire station. This is to ensure that in case of an emergency, the fire engines reach the building without delay.

Corporation readying a proposal seeking Rs. 134 crore from Union Government. Singanallur tank may get a fresh lease of life if the Coimbatore Corporation has its way.

The Corporation is readying a proposal seeking Rs. 134 crore from the Union Government under phase two of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission to clean the tank and a few others in the city.

Eyebrows are being raised on why the ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) has been sitting on the Western Ghats ecology report for almost six months.

The MoEF had appointed a Western Ghats Ecology Expert Committee (WGEEC) under the chairmanship of leading environmentalist Madhav Gadgil to prepare a roadmap for the Western Ghats region which is under increasing threat, especially from the influential mining lobby operating in Goa and Maharashtra.

Industrial houses come forward to offer guards; free seedlings to be given against promise of proper upkeep

You can not miss the signboards propped up on medians at prominent localities in the city, flashing messages of planting trees, and urging residents to avoid using plastics. With going green being the new watchword, efforts in creating awareness of increasing green cover have paid off.

The Nuclear Power Corporation (NPC) has stepped up its plan to reachout to villagers in the vicinity of the upcoming Kudankulam nuclear power project in Tamil Nadu, in a bid to remove their misunderstandings and explain to them the safety features of the proposed 2,000-Mw plant.

A similar drive has been launched at the 20 nuclear plants across the country, NPC executive director N Nagaich said on Friday. Apart from meeting villagers individually, the state-run corporation lays emphasis on organising plant visits, holding scientific meetings and interactive sessions.

The main reason for the rapid drop in green cover in Andhra Pradesh seems to be hidden in the Forest Survey of India's (FSI) latest data on forest fires.