The Government has released a new categorization of industries based on their pollution load.  Releasing the new categorization recently, Minister of State (Independent Charge) of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Prakash Javadekar, said, "The new category of White industries which is practically non-polluting will not require Environmental Clearance (EC) and Consent and will help in getting finance from lending institutions.

The exercise of Re-categorization was being carried out for last one year. This is a landmark decision to give a fair picture of the industries".

"Re-categorization of industries based on their pollution load is a scientific exercise. The old system of categorization was creating problems for many industries and was not reflecting the pollution of the industries. The new categories will remove this lacuna and will give clear picture to everyone. 25 industrial sectors which were not critically polluting were also earlier categorized as Red. This was creating wrong impression to everyone", Javadekar added.

The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) has developed the criteria of categorization of industrial sectors based on the Pollution Index which is a function of the emissions (air pollutants), effluents (water pollutants), hazardous wastes generated and consumption of resources.

For this purpose the references are taken from the the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution ) Cess (Amendment) Act, 2003, Standards  so far prescribed for  various pollutants under Environment (Protection) Act , 1986 and Doon Valley Notification, 1989 issued by MoEFCC.

The Pollution Index PI of any industrial sector is a number from 0 to 100 and the increasing value of PI denotes the increasing degree of pollution load from the industrial sector.

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