Current Affairs 20-07-2020

U.S.-India strategy energy partnership (SEP)

What is in News?

U.S. Secretary of Energy and Indian Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas co-chaired the 2nd meeting of the U.S.-India Strategic Energy Partnership (SEP).

About :

• The two sides signed a MOU to begin cooperation on Strategic Petroleum Reserves operation and maintenance. They also discussed the possibility of India storing oil in the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve to increase their nation’s strategic oil stockpile.

• USAID announced partnership with Power System Operation Corporation (POSOCO) to develop India’s National Open Access Registry (NOAR).

• The sides launched a public-private Hydrogen Task Force to help scale up technologies to produce hydrogen from renewable energy and fossil fuel sources.

• They also signed an MOU to collaborate on India’s first-ever Solar Decathlon in 2021.

• The U.S. Department of Commerce launched an Energy Industry Working Group for India under the Asia EDGE initiative to facilitate private sector connections and ideas for U.S.-India energy cooperation, including on innovative and disruptive technologies.

• They announced new areas of research on transformational power generation based on supercritical CO2 (sCO2) power cycles and advanced coal technologies for power generation and hydrogen production, including carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS).

U.S.-India Strategic Energy Partnership (SEP)?

• SEP was established in 2018 at the direction of President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, recognizing the strategic importance of energy to the U.S.-India bilateral relationship.

• The SEP organizes inter-agency engagement on both sides across four primary pillars of cooperation: (1) Power and Energy Efficiency; (2) Oil and Gas; (3) Renewable Energy; and (4) Sustainable Growth.

• The two countries are also leading joint R&D through the U.S.-India Partnership to Advance Clean Energy-Research (PACE-R) on smart grids and energy storage.

Bhagirathi eco-sensitive zone

What is in  news?

Union Environment Minister informed that the Zonal Master Plan (ZMP) of Bhagirathi Eco-Sensitive Zone has been approved by the government.

About:

• The Bhagirathi Eco-Sensitive Zone notification from Gaumukh to Uttarakashi covering an area of 4179 sq. kilometre was issued by the Ministry of Environment in 2012.

• The notification mandated the State Government of Uttarakhand to prepare ZMP to be implemented under the supervision of the Monitoring Committee.

• The ZMP is based on watershed approach and includes governance in the area of forest and wildlife, watershed management, energy, tourism, road infrastructure, etc.

• The approval of ZMP will give a boost to conservation and ecology of the area and also to undertake developmental activities as permitted under ZMP. This will also pave way for faster execution of the CHAARDHAM ROAD PROJECT in Uttarakhand.

• The Chaardham Project proposes to connect Yamnotri, Gangotri, Badrinath and Kedarnath which host Chaardham Yatra in the State of Uttarakhand. The all-weather Chaardham Road has in all 53 projects of 826 km length, involving an investment of Rs 12000 crore.

Desert Locust

What is in news?

Union Government today said that locust control operations have been carried out in more than 3.5 lakh hectares area of nine states till July 16, 2020.

About:

• What is a Desert Locust? The Desert locusts (Schistocerca gregaria) is one of about a dozen species of short-horned grasshoppers (Acridoidea).

• Where do they breed? For laying eggs, they require bare ground, which is rarely found in areas with dense vegetation. So, they can breed in Rajasthan but not in the Indo-Gangetic plains or Godavari and Cauvery delta.

Where are they found?

• During quiet periods, known as recessions, Desert Locusts are usually found only in the semi-arid and arid deserts of Africa, the Near East and South-West Asia that receive less than 200 mm of rain annually.

• When weather and habitat conditions are right for reproduction, multiple generations of locusts can be born and form swarms that invade countries that don’t usually have locust problems.

• How big are the swarms? The swarms can be anything from under one km2 to several hundred km2. There can be from 40 million to 80 million adult locusts in each square kilometre of a swarm.

• How do locusts move and behave? Desert Locusts usually fly with the wind at a speed of about 16-19 km/h. Swarms take off about 2 hours after sunrise, fly during the day, and settle just before sunset. They can travel up to 130 to 150km or more in a day.

What harm do locusts do?

• Desert Locusts are polyphagous and feed on leaves, shoots, flowers, fruit, seeds, stems and bark. They can eat massive quantities of vegetation – wild plants, shrubs, trees and grass. This can badly erode the food security of communities.

• Locusts do not attack people or animals. There is no evidence to suggest that they carry diseases that could harm humans.

What methods are used to control Desert Locusts?

• There are three types of commonly accepted standard practices in locust control: (1) Conventional pesticides, (2) Biopesticides and (3) Insect growth regulators.

• The primary method of controlling them is with mainly organophosphate chemicals applied in small concentrated doses, referred to as ultra-low volume (ULV) formulation.

Draft environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Norms 2020

What is in news?

Opposition parties have claimed that the draft Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) norms 2020 is a regressive departure from the 2006 version it seeks to replace.

About:

• Under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, India notified its first EIA norms in 1994, setting in place a legal framework for regulating activities that access, utilise, and affect (pollute) natural resources.

• Every development project has been required to go through the EIA process for obtaining prior environmental clearance ever since.

• The 1994 EIA notification was replaced with a modified draft in 2006. Earlier this year, the government redrafted it again to incorporate the amendments and relevant court orders issued since 2006, and to make the EIA “process more transparent and expedient.”

Contentious Provisions of the 2020 draft:

• Linear projects such as roads and pipelines in border areas will not require any public hearing. The ‘border area’ is defined as “area falling within 100 kilometres aerial distance from the Line of Actual Control with bordering countries of India.

• All inland waterways projects and expansion/widening of national highways will be exempt from prior clearance. These include roads that cut through forests and dredging of major rivers.

• It also exempts most building construction projects of built-up area up to 1,50,000 sq. m.

• It also contains provisions for post-facto project clearance and abandoning the public trust doctrine. Projects operating in violation of the Environment Act will now be able to apply for clearance.

• Violations of the provisions has to be reported either by a government authority or the developers themselves. There is no scope for any public complaint about violations. Instead, the reliance is on the violators to disclose, Suo motu, that they broke the law.

Monoclonal Antibodies

What is in news?

Pharma major Biocon announced has received the approval of the DCGI to market Itolizumab for treatment of cytokine release syndrome (CRS) in COVID-19 patients. Itolizumab is a monoclonal antibody which is used to treat acute psoriasis.

About:

• Monoclonal antibodies are proteins cloned in the lab to mimic antibodies produced by the immune system to counter an infection.

• They have their genesis in serum, the colourless constituent of blood that contains antibodies. These proteins bind to an antigen, the fragment of an infectious virus in the case of SARS-CoV-2, and either destroy it or block its action.

FORM 26AS

What is in news?

Income Tax Department has rolled out new Form 26AS with an aim to assist Tax payers in filing quick and correct Income Tax Return (ITR).

About:

• The earlier Form 26AS used to give information regarding tax deducted at source and tax collected at source relating to a PAN, besides certain additional information including details of other taxes paid, refunds and TDS defaults.

• But now, Form 26AS has been revamped to an 'Annual Information Statement' which will carry additional details on taxpayers financial transactions as specified in the Statement of Financial Transactions (SFTs) in various categories.

• This will help the taxpayers recall all their major financial transactions so that they have a ready reckoner to enable them while filing the ITR. This will facilitate voluntary compliance, tax accountability and ease of e-filing of returns.

P-7 Heavy Drop System (P-7 HDS)

What is in news?

DRDO has developed P7 Heavy Drop System which is capable of para dropping military stores up to 7-ton weight class from IL-76 aircraft.

About:

• P-7 Heavy Drop System is used for Para drop of military stores (vehicle/ ammunition/ equipment) of 7 Ton weight class.

• Heavy Drop System (P-7 HDS) for IL-76 Aircraft consists of aa multi-stage parachute system (comprising of 5 Main canopies, 5 Brake chutes, 2 Auxiliary chutes, 1 Extractor parachute) and platform (a metallic structure made up of Aluminium/steel alloys).

• It has been developed successfully with 100% indigenous resources. P-7 HDS has been inducted in the Army.

Bathynomus Raksasa

What is in news?

Scientists have discovered a new species in the eastern Indian Ocean (near Indonesia) called ‘Bathynomus raksasa’, a ‘supergiant’ Bathynomus, and which has since been described as the “cockroach of the sea”.

About:

• The Bathynomus raksasa is a giant isopod in the genus Bathynomus.

• The giant isopods are distantly related to crabs, lobsters, and shrimps (which belong to the order of decapods), and are found in the cold depths of the Pacific, Atlantic, and Indian Oceans.

• The “cockroach of the sea” has 14 legs. It measures around 50 centimetres (1.6 feet) in length, which is big for isopods, which normally do not grow beyond 33 cm (just over a foot). Isopods that reach 50 cm are referred to as supergiant’s.

• The only member of the isopod species that exceeds the raksasa in size is the Bathynomus giganteus, which is commonly found in the deep waters of the western Atlantic Ocean.

• Significance of discovery: It is the first 'supergiant' isopod species to be discovered in the eastern Indian Ocean. The discovery takes the number of known giant isopods to 20.