Even as the 530-km SilverLine semi-high-speed rail project has been projected as one aimed at attaining ‘net-zero emission’ while transporting people en masse, questions are being raised about from where and how the massive volume of aggregate (sand, gravel and crushed rock), mud, and other raw materials will be sourced.
Critics have been sceptical of the statements of K-Rail officials that the materials for the ₹63,794-crore project will be transported by train at little cost from neighbouring States. They cite the much-smaller Vizhinjam port project as an example of how difficulties in procuring raw materials can hold up a project.
DSR important
Environmental lawyer Harish Vasudevan says the rail project’s detailed project report must specify the quantity of raw material needed and the district survey report (DSR) of minerals that will specify the quantity of aggregate and other materials that will have to be quarried/mined for a project.
“A government notification in 2018 specifies the need to regulate demand and supply of minerals from each district. The materials cannot be sourced from any district in the country unless the demand for the rail project has been mentioned in the respective DSR,” he says.
For example, each district in Tamil Nadu, from where raw materials are intended to be sourced for SilverLine, ought to specify that such and such quantity will be given for the rail project and issue passes for transporting the same. The stakeholders of the Vizhinjam project are now running from pillar to post since there was lack of clarity on the places from where aggregate and other critical materials will be sourced, says Mr. Vasudevan.
K-Rail sources say such hassles can be overcome since DSRs will have little implication on the raw materials needed for the SilverLine project. “This is because we do not look at the property-wise components, but rather parameters like their crushing strength.
“Construction of new highways and roads too need vast quantity of mud and aggregate. They are not built out of thin air. We would lessen the impact of quarrying and earth-mining, by including alternatives such as fly ash, a byproduct from thermal power plants, in the construction to lessen reliance on cement and aggregate,” they say.
