Govt to implement new tower emission norms from Sept 1

NEW DELHI: The government has announced to implement new tower emission norms from September 1, 2012. However, there are no reports of any harmful health effects due to radiations from mobile towers.

Under the new norms, emission from mobile towers will be reduced by 1/10 of the current standards.

In a written reply to the Rajya Sabha, the Minister of State for Communications and IT Milind Deora said, “The effect of emission from cell phone towers is not known yet with certainity. However, as a precautionary measure, IMC recommended for reduction of base station emissions to 1/10th of the existing prescribed limit.”

To examine the health related concerns arising out of mobile towers radiations, an inter-ministrial committee (IMC) on electro-magnetic field (EMF) was constituted by Department of Telecom (DoT).

In 2008, DoT had adopted the EMF norms in respect of mobile towers prescribed by International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP).