50% thermal plants do not meet fly ash use norms, says environment group

Uttar Pradesh and Chhattisgarh lead in fly ash generation; most plants blamed for flouting norms are owned by governments

Half the coal-fired power plants in India flout norms asking them to use polluting fly ash they generate, said the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) in a report. Some plants don’t even utilise 30-40 per cent of the fly ash.

A notification by the ministry of environment, forest and climate change (MoEFCC) in 1999 laid down the targets for utilisation of fly ash.

"In the last decade, coal consumption and fly ash generation from coal power plants has jumped up by almost 80 per cent. On an average, 35 per cent of fly ash remain unutilised in this decade, leading to