INDIAN NAVY – BLUE WATER OPERATIONS WITH A GREEN FOOTPRINT

INDIAN NAVY – BLUE WATER OPERATIONS WITH A GREEN FOOTPRINT

Subject : Environment / Current Events

Context : Indian Navy has adopted a comprehensive ‘Indian Navy Environment Conservation Roadmap (INECR)’ for synergising the aim of ‘Blue Water Operations with a Green Footprint’.

Concept :

• Indian Navy commissioned one of its largest solar plant with a capacity of 3MW at Indian Naval Academy (INA), Ezhimala in July 2020. Another 2MW solar power plant was installed at Naval Station Karanja, Mumbai in July 2020. With this, the overall installed solar plant capacity at Naval Stations is 11 MW.
• The installation of SPVs are in line with Navy’s objective of fulfilling Govt of India’s ‘Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM)’ mission.
• Further, viability of setting up urban forests concepts such as Miyawaki forests is being emphasised to match the theme of World Environment Day 2021- ‘Ecosystem Restoration’

Miyawaki method of forest creation

• Miyawaki is a technique pioneered by Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki (born 1928), that helps build dense, native forests.
• The approach is supposed to ensure that plant growth is 10 times faster and the resulting plantation is 30 times denser than usual.
• It involves planting dozens of native species in the same area, and making them maintenance-free after the first three years.
• In July 2020, Union Environment Minister inaugurated a unique urban forest at the office of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG) in New Delhi.
• This would be a dense urban forest with multiple tree layers including 12000 saplings of 59 indigenous species in another year or so. The Miyawaki method of forest creation is employed.