Agatti Island

1. The National Green Tribunal (NGT) ordered the Lakshadweep administration not to fell the coconut trees
for construction of a beach road.

2. The tribunal constituted a committee to look into violations of Integrated Island Management Plan (IIMP)
that was approved by the Lakshadweep administration.

3. The coconut trees act as a source of income for the local people and also act as a green belt to protect
against the cyclones and other natural calamities in the Island.

4. Agatti Island is a coral atoll in the Union territory of Lakshadweep

Source: The Hindu

National Transit Pass system

1. It is an online system for issuing transit permits for timber, bamboo and other forest produce.

2. It was developed by the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change.

3. It will ensure ease of business and issue the transit permits online through a portal without physically
going to the forest officers to get the permits.

4. This also helps in monitoring and recording the transit permits for intra and inter state transportation of
timber that is grown both in private /government lands.
5. It is a pilot project and functional only in Madhya Pradesh and Telangana and will slowly be expanded to
other states.

Source: DD news

Dhole Conservation
1. According to a study by Wildlife Conservation Society, Karnataka, Maharashtra, and Madhya
Pradesh rank high in the conservation of the endangered dhole in India.

2. It states that Arunachal Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Telangana, and Goa will need to increase
financial investments in the forest and wildlife sectors.

3. They need to reduce the ease of granting forest clearances for infrastructure projects.

4. Dholes play an important role as apex predators in forest ecosystems.

5. Besides the tiger, the dhole is the only large carnivore in India that is under the International
Union for Conservation of Nature’s ‘endangered’ category.

Source- The Hindu

Seed Balls
1. Odisha’s Athagarh Forest Division has begun casting seed balls inside different reserve forest
areas to enrich food stock for wild elephants.

2. Seed Balls lead to the germination process and subsequent growth in bamboo plantations.

3. It will ensure the food stocks for elephants and reduce the circumstances of Human-elephant
conflicts.

4. Bamboos are evergreen perennial flowering tree-like grasses in the subfamily Bambusoideae of
the grass family Poaceae.

5. The elephants love bamboo shoots.

OSOWOG initiative
1. The Union Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) has put calls for proposals to the One
Sun, One World, One Grid (OSOWOG) initiative on hold.

2. It aims at connecting solar energy supply across borders. This has now been extended to all
forms of renewable energy.

3. The World Bank was providing technical assistance for the project.

4. It was launched with the slogan of ‘The Sun Never Sets’, to point out that solar energy supply
would be constant at any geographical location and point of time.

5. There are many issues with the project like intricate geopolitics, unfavourable economics,
unwarranted globalisation and undue centralisation that act against the concept.

Source: Down to Earth.

Project Dolphin
1. Environment Ministry has stated that it will launch a holistic Project Dolphin for the conservation
and protection of Dolphins in the rivers and in oceans of the country.

2. The Ministry is also planning to launch the Project Lion, while the lion population in the country
has increased to over 600.
3. The Ministry has also urged states to use 80% of Compensatory Afforestation Fund
Management and Planning Authority fund in plantation activities and 20% on capacity building and
infrastructure creation.

Source: AIR

Thermal Power Plants

1. Several thermal power plants are likely to miss the government’s 2022 deadline for installing
equipment to minimise pollution from their operations.

2. The Ministry of Power is recommending the extension of the deadline by up to 2 years for 322
power plants out of total 448 in the country.

3. All these units were planned for flue-gas desulfurization (FGD) systems that remove SO2 from
exhaust flue gases.

5. The norms were mandated in 2015 by MoEFCC for all existing coal-based plants.

6. The major issues for the delays are

a. Financing - Banks were reluctant to finance.

b. The government’s Make in India push and the ensuing requirement for a large proportion of
value addition capacity to be domestically sourced.

Source: The Indian Express

Harit Path app

1. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has developed a mobile app, 'Harit Path' to facilitate
creation of Green Highways across the country.

2. The App will also be used to monitor location, growth, species details, maintenance activities, targets
and achievements of each of the PSU's field units for every plant under the Highway plantation projects.

3. NHAI had also undertaken a nation-wide plantation drive, Harit Bharat Sankalp, under which it planted
over 25 lakh plants in 25 days along the stretches of the National Highways across the country.

4. Highway contractors have been made accountable for proper upkeep and maintenance of the
plantations.
5. Under this initiative, the payment to the contractors for the plantation work has been linked with the
growth of the plants.

Source: DD News.

Water the hood platform

1. This platform has an interactive map that can trace and track 625,000 trees in Berlin, including their
type, age and water needs.

2. It helps to ensure Berlin’s trees get enough water during the hot summer months as part of a new
neighbourhood initiative.

3. Each time a tree has been watered it can be entered into the system, with the correct amount of litres
that shows other users that the tree has been taken care of.

4. The platform was launched by CityLAB, a foundation-backed body that looks at future concepts for
Berlin’s metropolitan area.

Source: Reuters.

Global warming
1. According to research, 28 trillion tonnes of ice has disappeared from the surface of the Earth
since 1994.

2. Analyzing satellite surveys found that melting glaciers and ice sheets could cause sea levels to
rise dramatically, possibly reaching a meter by the end of the century.

3. The findings match the worst-case-scenario predictions outlined by the United Nations
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

4. Other researchers discovered that Greenland 's ice sheet may have passed a point of no return.

Source: Business Insider.

Dams & sea level rise

1. According to a new study, the construction of large-scale dams has played a role in limiting
rising seas.

2. Dams stalled the rising seas in the 1970s because of the amount of water they prevented from
entering the oceans.
3. Without these dams, the annual rate of rise would have been around 12% higher.

4. The study also finds that the overall sea level has risen by approximately 1.56mm per year
between 1900 and 2018.

5. The largest contributors to rising seas over most of the 20th century have been melting glaciers
that have responded faster to a warmer world.

Source: BBC News