By Rohan
Abeywardena
The days are numbered for those operating belching vehicles with the Vehicle Emission Testing Scheme being launched on July 15 and the Motor Traffic Commissioner scheduled to make the testing mandatory from August 15, official sources said yesterday.
The long delayed scheme has been entrusted to two companies CleanCo Lanka Ltd. and Laugf EcoSri Pvt. Ltd. Project Director of CleanCo Anura Vidanagamage said under their Rs.525 million investment they had already completed 13 main testing stations and 40 mobile stations. By August 15 three more permanent stations and 15 mobile stations would be added. On July 15 Ministers Dallas Alahapperuma and Champika Ranawaka will ceremonially declare open their main station at Welisara, Mahabage while.
Project manager of Laugf EcoSri D.L.R. Shermal said the two ministers will declare open their main testing centre at Miriswatte, Gampaha on the same day too.
Their total investment was Rs.450 million and by the launch date 16 permanent centres and 10 mobile centres would be ready.
Sources said once the testing is made mandatory on August 15 vehicle revenue licences would not be renewed without the emission test certificate from a testing centre. As these two companies have made heavy investments they are permitted to recover their investment through fees levied for such tests. The test fees that have been approved are: motor cycle Rs.247.50, motor tricycle Rs.302.50, motor car Rs.660, van Rs.715, Lorry Rs.935, Bus Rs.605, and prime mover Rs.990.
With some 55 per cent of the country’s vehicles being found in the Western Province, the bulk of the testing centres are sited here.
Preliminary surveys have revealed that between 10 to 20 per cent of the vehicles on Lankan roads are expected to fail the emission tests. And contrary to the general belief that buses and lorries are the worst polluters, these tests have revealed that double cabs and school vans are the biggest violators.
The much postponed compulsory emission testing regimen was earlier scheduled to begin from April this year, but was put off with both the Department of Motor Traffic and the two companies contracted to launch the programme blaming each other for the delays.
The main complaint of the two companies was that the Department was dragging its feet in preparing the relevant agreement for signature and the undue delay in issuing the relevant gazette to make the entire exercise legal.
The gazette was issued on January 25, while the relevant agreements were signed last July.
Motor Traffic Commissioner B. Wijayaratne said it was nonsense to blame his Department as under the terms of the contract it calls for the implementation within eight months of signing the agreement.
The two companies CleanCo Lanka Ltd and Laugf EcoSri Pvt. Ltd however insisted that without those documents in place they were badly handicapped as even banks did not come forward with funding without the relevant documents.
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