Allotment of about 1,095 plots by the Capital Development Authority (CDA) in I-9, I-10 industrial estates against the total 1,030 planned earlier, will compound the problems of the adjacent residential sectors.
According to a survey, conducted by the Business Recorder, at present 500 factories are operating in these two industrial estates. These units are spreading water and air pollution in the area.
Experts said the pollution would be beyond imagination with the commissioning of 500 more industrial plants in those areas.
The survey said that out of total 500 existing plants, there were 204 manufacturing units in the area.
It further said the industries adding more pollution were steel furnaces, ghee and oil mills, G.I. pipes, soap, chemical, plastic, marble, chilies/spices and printing, which either no or inadequate facilities for treatment of their emissions and discharges, like industrial wastes.
The residents of I-9 and I-10 Sectors repeatedly complained against diseases like chest congestion and asthma, which were directly linked to air pollution.
The survey also revealed that ambient air quality in the affected areas of those industrial estates had never been tested due to non-availability of adequate facilities even the quality of industrial effluent had not properly been checked by the concerned department.
Sources said the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the CDA had held several meetings with the owners of those industries and served frequent notices but the problem was still unresolved.
The major pollutant industrial units in the Federal Capital were steel furnaces (6 Nos), marble (32 Nos), G. I. Pipe (02 Nos), ghee/oil (04 Nos), soap/chemicals (18 Nos), Polymer (1 Nos), plastic/polyphone (4 Nos), flour mills (10 Nos), PVC pipes (1 Nos), beverages (1 Nos) and chilies/spices grinding (1 Nos), sources in the EPA revealed.
They said the steel melting furnaces, steel re-rolling mills, marble factors and other industrial units, established in the two industrial zones, were the major sources of spreading environmental pollution by emitting hazardous smoke from hoods as well as toxic industrial effluents without proper treatment, causing respiratory diseases in the vicinity.
However, the Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (Pepa) and the CDA have completely ignored the issue to take effective measures in the most polluted area of Islamabad.
According to estimates, collected by the Pepa sources, about 1,500 tonnes effluents per day, generated through the pharmaceutical industry, flour mills, oil and ghee mills, marble factories and plastic extrusion mills, was being thrown into Leh Nullah.
Consequently, it had polluted the underground water to alarming proportions, sources said, adding the discharges of untreated industrial waste were causing adverse effects on public health by drinking pollutant water.
Sources also revealed the Pepa, with the help of the Jica experts, had already conducted a comprehensive study of the I-9 and I-10 industrial areas, and pinpointed the major polluting industrial units in the areas.
They suggested strict implementation of the National Environmental Quality Standards (NEQS) by setting up solid/liquid waste treatment plants and smoke emission hoods for safe dispersal of toxic particles.
However, a year back, the CDA had given three-month deadline to the owners of the steel furnaces, included in the CDA'S negative list, to control the increasing pollution in the Federal Capital Industrial Estate, otherwise their cases would be sent to the EPA Court.
Sources said that it was not pursued properly and the matter had been thrown into the cold storage.
Of the total 400 steel furnaces, only six are in the Federal Capital's two industrial zones, which continued to flout the EPA approved standard instruments in controlling emission of dangerous particles.
The capital's civic body has also banned trade licences for the establishment of the steel furnaces or smoke-emitting mills.
It is worth mentioning that the CDA had compiled a negative list, comprising at least 23 industries - explosives items, all type of chemical and acid manufacturing industry, cement, glass manufacturing, pesticides, steel industry (except re-rolling mills), metal finishing and electroplating/galvanising, paints, varnishes and lacquers, production of toxic gases, tanning and leather finning, poultry, animal and feed mills, plastic shopping bags industry, dyes and printing inks, basic rubber processing, fertiliser, pulp and paper, synthetic fibre, textile processing, thermal power plants (coal fired), petrochemicals manufacturing, boilers, oven, kilns and furnaces (coal fired), brick kilns and chili grinding etc.
The CDA took the initiative on the directive of the Supreme Court after several complaints filed by the residents of I-9, I-10 industrial estate in June 1999, sources said.
The CDA also introduced a one-window facility for the capital area industrialists to change trade by paying Rs 50 per square yard.
The Environment Directorate angrily instructed the steel mill owners to make it sure that those furnaces would utilise bonded scrape to help control less emission of hazardous and diluted smoke from the hoods.
The CDA had the power to fine the violators, but could not force them to cease their business, as the civic body had itself allowed them to set up furnaces to meet the demands of the capital during early years, official said.
The Pepa had already set a standard of 100-foot for the installation of smoke-emitting hoods on such kinds of mills to disperse dust particles, harming human health.
But, they (steel mill owners) are not willing to do so, saying the fabrication of hoods and installation of blower/flitter is not cost effective in terms of electric consumption.
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