Panaji | Oct 26, 2017: Following a recent decision by Goa state pollution control board (GSPCB), over 30% of the state's iron ore mining leases will possibly not be granted consent to operate. The board's decision comes in the light of a recent Supreme Court judgement in the Odisha mining case.

Member secretary of the pollution board, Levinson Martins, told TOI that they have decided to neither renew nor grant fresh consents to mining leases with environmental clearances (EC) under the 1994 Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) notification. The decision, he said, comes after the recent SC judgement in the Odisha mining case that declared the said EIA invalid.

The board has started the process of issuing showcause notices for rejection of consent to operate to those who have applied for renewal, Martins said, adding that notices will also be issued to those submitting fresh applications with ECs under the 1994 notification.

The state government has renewed around 89 mining leases of which approximately 34 have ECs under the 1994 notification, while the remaining have it under the 2006 notification, sources said.

Earlier, the board had granted consent to six leases with ECs under the 1994 notification, which are due for renewal, sources said.

"There are around 13 applications pending before the board," he said.

The pollution board on Wednesday issued consent to operate to two more mines, including one in the Sonshi cluster, with the extraction limit set to around 1 million tonnes.

Last week, eight mining leases were issued consent to operate with an extraction limit of over 2 million tonnes. The mines are located at Sanquem, Quepem, Pale and Adval Pal.

The directorate of mines and geology had renewed 89 mining leases in the state of which around 59 were operational last year. While mining companies exhausted the capping limit of 20 million tonnes, only over 14 million tonnes of iron ore were exported for Goa.

(Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/)