{"id":285223,"date":"2021-06-27T20:15:17","date_gmt":"2021-06-27T17:15:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/bangladesh-scraps-10-coal-fired-power-plants\/"},"modified":"2021-06-27T20:15:17","modified_gmt":"2021-06-27T17:15:17","slug":"bangladesh-scraps-10-coal-fired-power-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/bangladesh-scraps-10-coal-fired-power-plants\/","title":{"rendered":"#Bangladesh scraps 10 coal-fired power plants"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Bangladesh scraps 10 coal-fired power plants<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

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\"Labourers
\n Labourers unload coal from a cargo ship in Gabtoli on the outskirts of Dhaka.
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Bangladesh announced Sunday that it has scrapp<\/a>ed at least 10 major coal-fired power plants as it seeks to scale up its power generation from renewable energy sources.<\/p>\n

Nasrul Hamid, the state minister for power and energy, said the decision was taken in light of technological changes and as dozens of countries halt new coal-fired power projects due to their impact on the environment.<\/p>\n

“By 2041, there is a plan to generate 40 percent of power from renewable energy,” the ministry of energy and power said. <\/p>\n

The minister said Dhaka would also import hydropower from Nepal and Bhutan.<\/p>\n

The scrapped power plants would have accounted for 8,451 megawatts of power and included ambitious multi-billion dollar projects unveiled by the government of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina since she took office in January 2009.<\/p>\n

The minister said they included a massive 1,320 megawatt plant on the ecologically fragile Maheshkhali island and a 1,200 megawatt project set to be constructed by a Bangladeshi-Japanese joint venture.<\/p>\n

Most of the plants were set to be built in Bangladesh’s coastal region, home to 20 million people.<\/p>\n

The announcement is seen as a victory for green activists who have staged a series<\/a> of protests against the coal-fired plants, saying they would cause irreparable damage to the country’s fragile ecology.<\/p>\n

Sharif Jamil, secretary of Bangladesh Poribesh Andolon, the country’s main environmental group, said they were happy with the announcement.<\/p>\n

“It is a very positive step. We thank the government for the bold and courageous step,” Jamil told AFP. <\/p>\n

But he added that he would like to see a major coal-fired power plant near the world’s largest mangrove forest also ditched.<\/p>\n

The controversial 1,320 megawatt power plant is being built at the southern coastal town of Rampal near the Sundarbans, a forest straddling Bangladesh and India that is home to the endangered Bengal tiger.<\/p>\n

The United Nations culture and science<\/a> agency said in 2016 there was a high chance that pollution from the $1.7 billion plant would “irreversibly damage” the Sundarbans.<\/p>\n

The forest provides a defence against storm surges and cyclones that have killed thousands of people in impoverished coastal villages and islands in recent years, and it was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997.<\/p>\n

The Rampal plant would be powered each year by nearly five million tons of coal transported by boat along fragile waterways.<\/p>\n

Jamil also said the prime minister, as the head of a forum for nations vulnerable to climate change, must also “develop a roadmap to come out of coal fully”.\n <\/p>\n\n

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UNESCO urges Bangladesh to scrap Sundarbans plant<\/a>\n <\/div>\n

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\n \u00a9 2021 AFP<\/p>\n

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Citation<\/strong>:
\n Bangladesh scraps 10 coal-fired power plants (2021, June 27)
\n retrieved 27 June 2021
\n from https:\/\/techxplore.com\/news<\/a>\/2021-06-bangladesh-scraps-coal-fired-power.html<\/p>\n

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