NGT orders Tamil Nadu government to notify Chennai's Ennore under wetland mission

CHENNAI: The Southern Bench of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) has directed the Tamil Nadu government to notify the full extent of the 'last remaining' portion of the Ennore wetlands under Tamil Nadu Wetland Mission to protect it from further encumbrances.

If the NGT order is implemented, no new project can come up in Ennore, which is one of the most industrialised regions of the State housing multiple ports, power plants and large petrochemical complexes.

The wetland is key to Chennai's flood mitigation and preservation of fresh water aquifers. Several new projects proposed in the Ennore wetland complex, including the expansion of Kattupalli port, may be hit because of the NGT order.

In its final order in a case filed by Ennore fishers Ravimaran (late) and RL Srinivasan, and fisher activist K Saravanan seeking remediation of ash-choked wetlands, the NGT bench comprising judicial member Justice K Ramakrishnan and expert member K Satyagopal directed the Department of Environment to ensure that a detailed project report (DPR) is readied in nine months as per the comprehensive Terms of Reference (ToR) issued by the Joint Experts Committee in March 2022.

"If remediation is done as per the ToRs issued by the expert panel, we are certain that the river will return to life. This will help lift local fishers from poverty, and protect north Chennai from flooding," said K Saravanan of Save Ennore Creek campaign.

The order directed the Additional Chief Secretary, Environment, Forests and Climate Change to study the “unutilized” Ennore wetlands on the basis of the 1996 Coastal Zone Management Plan and protect that area against further development, declare it as Ennore wetlands under the government’s wetland mission and develop a plan for restoration of the fragile Ennore creek ecosystem and Ennore wetland complex.

The tribunal has also directed the Chief Secretary to constitute a committee headed by district collector with officials from Greater Chennai Corporation, Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB) and Tangedco as members to hold quarterly meetings to hear and address public grievances regarding the State power utility’s functioning in the area. It has tasked the TNPCB to prosecute and penalise Tangedco for its unlicensed operation.

"We are overjoyed. Notifying the area covered by the 1996 Coastal Zone Management Plan as a wetland under Wetland Mission and restoring the wetlands will be the most effective defence against the extreme weather events that will become commonplace in the coming days due to climate change," said RL Srinivasan, a fisher from Kattukuppam in Ennore.

Meanwhile, Tamil Nadu Wetland Authority has already asked the Tiruvallur district collector to list all the wetland areas and submit a report.    

In its 466 page report, the nine-member expert committee headed by former IAS officer Santha Sheela Nair, who also served as vice-chairperson of Tamil Nadu State Planning Commission, has made scathing remarks on how fly ash pollution was causing havoc to the lives of local population and damaging the environment.

In the study area of 905 hectares, the report said the area under natural wetlands has gone down by 68%. Land use changes between 1996 and 2022 were considered for the study. Using time series maps as well as delineated fly ash map using satellite and UAV data specially obtained for this study, it was observed that in 1996, salt pans and water bodies covered a major part of the site with no visible fly ash deposition.    

The official data showed the salt pans area reduced from 553.37 hectares in 1996 to 95.55 ha; water bodies shrunk from 233.60 ha to 148.69 ha, while the area under mangroves vegetation dropped from 68.72 ha to 33.74 ha.

Overall, area under wetlands shrunk from 855.69 ha in 1996 to 277.92 ha in 2022. Meanwhile, during the same period, land built-up increased from 0 hectares to 259.87 ha and area covered by fly ash increased from 0 ha to 260.28 hectares.

Balaji Narasimhan, noted hydrologist and professor at Department of Civil Engineering in IIT-Madras who conducted an independent study, estimated the total volume of fly ash deposition in the study area to be 39,83,002 cubic metres (approx. 5.67 million metric tonnes) of which 19,11,830 cubic metres (approx. 2.67 million metric tonnes) are present in the backwater and remaining in deposits in flood plains.

The NGT has directed the Chief Secretary to consider the grievances of the residents of Chepaukkam village situated near the ash pond and decide if they must be relocated from the area for safety. If the water quality is affected because of the activities of the NCTPS owned by TANGEDCO, then Tangedco must provide potable water to residents of the area till the water quality reaches potable level, the NGT order said.