National Highway Authority of India has chopped over 9000 trees in Gurgaon to develop a flyover and three underpasses.Meteorological departments are apprehensive that atmospheric temperature could rise up to 3 degree Celsius in the affected micro areas. Well, there is nothing new in this as various environmental reports have already illuminated that NCR region is suffering from severe air pollution. Regrettable thing is that majority of the trees were fully grown and more than 25 years old.
No doubt the situation of heavy traffic congestion would have coerced the government to cut down the trees on such a large scale. I don't deny. Infrastructure development is a dire need of cities today.But Gurgaon,unfortunately,has paid a heavy price for this.Cutting down trees massively will badly affect the environment and raise the average temperature of the region that too at the time when India has ratified Paris agreement and committed to adopt those practices which help reduce temperature globally.
This is not the first case of Development vs. Environment. The condition is that development must take place in such a way that its environmental consequences are minimum. Unfortunately, this has not happened in the present context. NHAI officials have claimed that they have taken prior permission from state forest department. I,however, doubt the methodologies used in Environmental Impact Assessment. More importantly, innovative technologies,which can actually mitigate negative consequences, have been ignored completely.
In the current system, responsible authorities usually do a plantation drive,in order to compensate,in some other areas. However, in the present context, there is not even such confirmation from NHAI as of now. It will take another 25-30 years to nurture plants and get them fully grown.
Case study of Europe:- European countries have evolved a new method to get rid of this problem. This method ,called Up-rooting, comprising the steps of digging a trench around the root system of the tree, cutting the roots and injecting a hardenable substance so as to prepare a ball of the earth to be dug up together with the tree.
Needless to say how effective is this method. Surprisingly, authorities have said that they do not possess such technologies and required equipments and infrastructure.
This is the problem. Why don't we have such equipments and infrastructure. India is said to be the forerunner when it comes to technology and innovation.Why can't we adopt such best practices and put into practice?
Recent Chennai Oil Spill is another fresh example. There are lot of techniques to tackle oil spills effectively. Bioremediation, Bioremediation accelerator,Dispersion,Dredging,Skimming etc. The point is- there is no dearth of techniques. The problem lies within our inefficiencies.
We talk about Sustainable Development in climate summits, set up ambitious targets, commit to take measures towards mitigation but when the time comes to actually implement, we fail to exteriorize.This is an alarming situation.It is high time that we must think over it, adopt best practices and technologies to make development sustainable.
Over 9,000 Trees Chopped In Gurgaon: A Road Towards Disaster
No doubt the situation of heavy traffic congestion would have coerced the government to cut down the trees on such a large scale. I don't deny. Infrastructure development is a dire need of cities today.But Gurgaon,unfortunately,has paid a heavy price for this.Cutting down trees massively will badly affect the environment and raise the average temperature of the region that too at the time when India has ratified Paris agreement and committed to adopt those practices which help reduce temperature globally.
This is not the first case of Development vs. Environment. The condition is that development must take place in such a way that its environmental consequences are minimum. Unfortunately, this has not happened in the present context. NHAI officials have claimed that they have taken prior permission from state forest department. I,however, doubt the methodologies used in Environmental Impact Assessment. More importantly, innovative technologies,which can actually mitigate negative consequences, have been ignored completely.
In the current system, responsible authorities usually do a plantation drive,in order to compensate,in some other areas. However, in the present context, there is not even such confirmation from NHAI as of now. It will take another 25-30 years to nurture plants and get them fully grown.
Case study of Europe:- European countries have evolved a new method to get rid of this problem. This method ,called Up-rooting, comprising the steps of digging a trench around the root system of the tree, cutting the roots and injecting a hardenable substance so as to prepare a ball of the earth to be dug up together with the tree.
Needless to say how effective is this method. Surprisingly, authorities have said that they do not possess such technologies and required equipments and infrastructure.
This is the problem. Why don't we have such equipments and infrastructure. India is said to be the forerunner when it comes to technology and innovation.Why can't we adopt such best practices and put into practice?
Recent Chennai Oil Spill is another fresh example. There are lot of techniques to tackle oil spills effectively. Bioremediation, Bioremediation accelerator,Dispersion,Dredging,Skimming etc. The point is- there is no dearth of techniques. The problem lies within our inefficiencies.
We talk about Sustainable Development in climate summits, set up ambitious targets, commit to take measures towards mitigation but when the time comes to actually implement, we fail to exteriorize.This is an alarming situation.It is high time that we must think over it, adopt best practices and technologies to make development sustainable.
Over 9,000 Trees Chopped In Gurgaon: A Road Towards Disaster
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