On June 14, the Department of Telecommunications has softened its stance on the green telecom when it gave telecom and tower operators a chance to present their views on how they will be implementing the government rules for being more environmentally compliant.
The representative bodies of the telecom operators have constantly been in touch with the government for some time to at least hear their grievances on the environmental norms that are based on the recommendations of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI).
The director general of COAI, Rajan Matthews said that the discussion with the government was constructive and the industry will now make a presentation on the action for the implementation of the environmental rules. On the other hand the main concern of the telecom companies is the deadline set by the government for moving to mobile towers run on hybrid power – environmental friendly energy and power grids.
The industry also believes that the formula used for measuring reduction in carbon emission was flawed. Matthews said, “There are complexities in formula and we will be coming out with a more scientific method of measuring reduction in emission”. The mobile operators have been asked to cut the carbon emission from their mobile networks by 5% by 2012 -13 and 17% by 2018-19.
