Bhubaneswar, July 13: The Orissa State Pollution Control Board (OSPCB) has identified 16 most polluting industries in Orissa. It has also made a classification of 143 polluting industries, tagging them as red (highly polluted), orange (medium polluted) and green (low polluted small-scale units).

“Of these 143 polluting industries, 16 have been identified as grossly polluting based on their contribution to water and air pollution. Industry discharging effluents more than 100kg per day and if its effluent contains any hazardous chemical then the industry is categorised as grossly polluting,” said the board’s member secretary Sidhanta Dash.

The highly polluting industries include Nalco’s captive power plant at Angul, NTPC super-thermal power station at Kaniha, Paradip Phosphate Limited and Talcher Thermal Power Station. Some other highly polluting industries are Central Orissa Straw Board, IDL Chemicals, INDAL Smelter, Ballarpur Industries, Jayashree Chemicals and Emami Paper Mill. These industries have been tagged as “red”.

OSPCB has also identified five industrial clusters — Angul, Paradip, Joda-Badbil, Kalinga Nagar and Ib Valley — where air, water and ground pollution level is alarming.

“This has prompted the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) to formulate a suggestive guideline to tame industrial pollution,” Dash added. The guideline will be finalised during a meeting scheduled to be held in New Delhi tomorrow. Representatives of state pollution control boards will attend it.

The state government, meanwhile, has initiated steps to conduct separate studies on the pollution level of these industrial clusters. While IIT-Kharagpur has been entrusted with the job of assessing the pollution level in Ib Valley, Indian School of Mines, Dhanbad, is studying the environmental aspects in Angul and pollution in the Joda-Barbil area is being studied by NERI, Nagpur. The institutes studying the biodiversity of these industrial clusters will give suggestive measures to control pollution apart from highlighting the pollution levels.

Major industrial houses tagged as grossly polluting claim that they are taking the necessary steps. “We are taking all possible steps to check pollution. We were recently planning to dispose of ash through backfilling of mine voids. This is a new initiative of NALCO,” said Jiban Mohapatra, chief manager (environment), Nalco.

However, environmentalists doubt whether the suggestions of CPCB will be followed in the true sense. “Industrial pollution in the state was a matter of concern since long. The state government has turned a blind eye towards it. If it is really concerned about the alarming rise of pollution level in these clusters, why is it not banning the new industries,” said Biswajit Mohanty, an environmentalist.

“The state government is interested only in industrialisation. Not towards mitigation of its impact on environment,” he rued. Orissa possesses 28 per cent of country’s iron ore, 24 per cent coal, 59 per cent bauxite and 98 per cent chromite. The state’s comparative advantage on this account has attracted the attention of many mining and metallurgical companies.

Currently, 2,754 industries including major, medium and small are operating in the state. There are also 924 crusher units. Besides this, the state government has signed 43 memorandums of understanding (MoUs) for production of 70 metric tonnes of steel every year and also 21 MoUs have been inked for setting up of thermal power plants.