Union Minister Sarbananda Sonowal launches ‘Harit Sagar’ the Green Port Guidelines 2023

NEW DELHI : To meet the larger vision of achieving Zero Carbon Emission Goal, Ministry of Ports, Shipping & Waterways has launched ‘Harit Sagar’ the Green Port Guidelines. The guidelines were launched by Shri Sarbananda Sonowal, Union Minister for Ports, Shipping & Waterways and AYUSH in the august presence of Shri Shripad Y. Naik, Union Minister of State for Ports, Shipping & Waterways and Tourism and other senior officials of the Ministry on Wednesday in New Delhi.

Harit Sagar Guidelines – 2023 envisages ecosystem dynamics in port development, operation and maintenance while aligning with ’Working with Nature’ concept and minimizing impact on biotic components of harbor ecosystem. It lays emphasis on use of Clean / Green energy in Port operation, developing Port capabilities for storage, handling and bunkering Greener Fuels viz. Green Hydrogen, Green Ammonia, Green Methanol / Ethanol etc.

These Guidelines provides a framework for the Major Ports for drawing out a comprehensive action plan for achieving targeted outcomes in terms of quantified reduction in carbon emission over defined timelines, through focused implementation and close monitoring of Green Initiatives and to achieve Sustainable Developmental Goals (SDG).

During the event the Union Minister Shri Sarbananda Sonowal said, ‘Ports are undertaking green initiatives and actively contributing to the fulfillment of the “Panchamrit” commitments announced by our Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi. The “Harit Sagar” Guidelines -2023 provide a comprehensive framework for our Major Ports, empowering them to create a comprehensive action plan aimed at achieving quantifiable reductions in carbon emissions over defined timelines’.

The objective of guidelines is to minimize waste through Reduce, Reuse, Repurpose and Recycle to attain zero waste discharge from port operations and promote monitoring, based on Environmental Performance Indicators. This also covers aspects of National Green Hydrogen Mission pertaining to ports, development of green hydrogen facility, LNG bunkering, Offshore Wind Energy etc and provides provision for adopting global Green Reporting Initiative (GRI) standard.           

‘The launch of the Harit Sagar Green Port Guidelines is a significant step towards achieving our sustainability goals. These guidelines have been formulated with the aim of promoting environmental friendly practices across all our Ports, said Shri Shripad Naik, MoS, MoPSW during the event.

Shri Sudhansh Pant, Secretary, MoPSW said, ‘Our four major ports Deendayal Port, Visakhapatnam Port, New Mangalore Port and VOC Port are already generating renewable energy more than their demand. From now onwards our ports will be able to evaluate themselves on the environmental indicators to know their capability in the environmental aspects.’

The major ports were conferred awards for their all time best performance on select operational and financial parameters during FY – 2022-23. Ports having registered highest incremental improvements were also honored and they were ranked on the basis of their overall performance during 2022-23. The idea is to generate fair and healthy competition amongst the Major ports & motivate them to perform better & better in the coming year.