With rising demand for infrastructure development in Bangladesh, both private and public, the demand for bricks has increased over the decades. To meet the demand, production has also risen.
The entire process damages the countrys environment in two ways: Increased air pollution and decreased soil fertility, as the current brickmaking methods depend on topsoil.
The Department of Environment, estimates that the nations 7,000 or so brickfields currently use 3,350 million cubic feet of topsoil or clay annually as a raw material to produce around 23 billion bricks.
Usually, after topsoil is removed, the land remains uncultivable and fallow for the next few years, which ultimately reduces agricultural production.
A study, says the construction industry is accountable for a significant portion of greenhouse gas emissions (30%), with an additional 18% resulting from indirect material exploitation and transportation. One million bricks are produced using about 240 tons of coal.
It reads that about 23,300 tons of particulate matter, 1.8 million tons of carbon dioxide, 302,000 tons of carbon monoxide and other highly hazardous compounds are released from brick kilns annually in the Dhaka region alone.
Considering the issues, the government decided to phase out conventional brickmaking methods and use alternative bricks, from concrete, sand and dredged soil from riverbeds.
"We have decided to use alternative bricks from this year for official constructions primarily," said Saber Hossain Chowdhury, the environment, forest and climate change minister, adding that conventional brick kilns will be gradually shut down and converted for alternative brickmaking so the country can stop using topsoil and cut air pollution in the next few years. —Mongabay
