Thursday, February 18, 2016

Simple brick tank composting

No underground pits, no fancy or complex organic digesters or converters. Sierra Towers uses a strip of simple brick tanks built along the wall at the far corner of the apartment compound for composting. Located in Lokhandwala, Kandivali East, Mumbai, Sierra Towers, houses about 220 families, and these compost tanks have been adequate to hold the wet waste of all the households.

Compost tanks at Sierra Towers, Jan 2016

'Don't kill our kids to keep your city clean' - Times of India

BENGALURU: The garbage gridlock worsened on Thursday. As the muck piles grew larger in Bengaluru city, furious villagers of Dodda mankalala in Doddaballapur, about 50 kms away, dug their heels in. "Why should the future of our children be at stake just to keep Bengaluru clean?

Protests spread to villages near other landfills

Bangalore, June 4, 2014, DHNS:

The garbage crisis in the City has deepened further with protests spreading to the villages near other landfills at Terra Firma in Doddaballapur and the Karnataka Compost Development Corporation (KCDC) unit at Kudlu, off Hosur Road, Bommanahalli.

Govt composting firm to review ties with Terra Firma on supplying organic compost: Akshatha M - Citizen Matters, Bangalore News

The tie up with private waste management firms in Bengaluru to help them market composting products made the profits of Karnataka Composting Development Corporation soar high. However, the composting firm conveniently ignored putting in place the required checks and balances.

The Karnataka Composting Development Corporation (KCDC) has decided to serve a notice to Terra Firma Biotechnologies Pvt Ltd, on cancellation of the agreement for supplying vermicompost, after the issue of garbage being sold as vermicompost came into light.

Residents near landfill sites begin protest as mayor's deadline ends

Bengaluru, Nov 2, 2015, DHNS:

BBMP lorries carrying the City's garbage have not been allowed to enter the two units and they remained stationed outside. DH file photo

Is BBMP squandering Rs. 200 crore?

The answer to the city’s mounting garbage problems lies in the complete implementation of segregation of waste at source. But, the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) can implement this only by bringing about a paradigm shift in the way citizens view solid waste management and cooperate with the civic body.

However, due to lack of will to segregate waste, mixed waste is being sent to the new processing units.

Despite knowing pretty well that segregation at source is a pre-requisite for the success of processing waste, BBMP has done precious little to enforce the segregation two-and-a-half years after it was made mandatory.

Many solid waste management experts blame the BBMP’s lack of planning and a roadmap for ruining the newly-constructed waste processing units.

What makes a project succeed in villages – Vellore C. Srinivasan, Project Director, Indian Green Service

Vellore C. Srinivasan is project director and consultant for solid and liquid resource management in the Indian Green Service (http://indiangreenservice.com), an environmental protection and service organisation. He was the chief guest at the Karma Yoga Second Annual Convention, in Great Lakes Institute of Management, where people from the nearby 21 villages had assembled.

Mumbai's solid waste management plans expensive, dangerous

The Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (mcgm) is expected to spend almost Rs 500 crore to develop waste processing technologies and scientifically manage its dumpyards at Gorai, Deonar, Mulund and Kanjurmarg (see map Mumbai dumping). Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services (il&fs), Mumbai-based consultants, have prepared the plans. But experts say the project will just be a drain on mcgm's finances.

For Clean India to work, country needs to solve its waste disposal problem

Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious project to make India a clean country, aims to teach citizens to reduce and even clean their own waste. But first a matter of real urgency needs to be sorted out: India needs to increase landfill area, even as it looks into overhauling its municipal solid waste management system.

India generates about 60 million tonnes of trash every year. Ten million tonnes of garbage is generated in just the metropolitan cities: Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Bangalore and Kolkata.

The landfills of most of these cities are already overflowing, with no space to accommodate fresh garbage waste.

Introduction | Why it’s important to segregate

Any and all waste management interventions are futile if they don’t address one fundamental problem: the lack of waste segregation at source. As long as people put their recyclable, organic, hazardous and sanitary waste in the same bin, the corporation collects and dumps it at either Perungudi or Kodungaiyur landfills. Sadly, the majority of Chennai’s citizenry take this for granted to be the only solution to household waste. Before you nod in agreement, let’s look at some facts: 47% of the waste going into landfills is organic waste and 18% is recyclable waste.

New age alchemists

More and more companies are making wealth from waste and, in the process, saving the environment from devastation. Business Today looks at five of these green businesses.

FABRIC FROM PLASTIC
Arora Fibres recycles discarded plastic bottles into polyester used as packaging material

Don't chuck out those plastic bottles that have been piling up in your kitchen for days. They can be re-used to make polyester fabric. Rupinder Singh Arora, Chairman of Arora Fibres Ltd, has been recycling discarded plastic bottles into polyester staple fibre since 1994 after he saw the colossal damage to the environment from mountains of bio-degradable plastic being burned in the country. "We were the pioneers in this field.

wastelands-of-india-heres-how-metros-manage-their-trash

For days starting Jan 28, a massive fire swept through Mumbai’s Deonar dump, a 90-year-old landfill that should have long been shut. It’s a similar story across India’s metros — of poor urban waste management leading to mounds of refuse, some as tall as five-storey buildings.

Mumbai

An ageing mound bears the brunt

Daily Waste: 9,600 Tonnes
No. of landfills: 3 – Deonar, Mulund and Kanjurmarg
Agency responsible: The Shiv Sena-held Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation

Can incinerators help manage India's growing waste management problem?

(Complaints are not uncommon…)

Can incinerators help manage India's growing waste management problem?

Hari Pulakkat, ET BureauApr 28, 2015, 10.12AM IST

Okhla waste-to-energy plant safe: Jayanthi Natarajan

Justifying the controversial waste-to-energy plant set up at Okhla, Union environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan, has said the emissions from the Jindal plant are well within the limits set under the Municipal Solid Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 2000.

Replying to a question by Jayprakash Narayan Singh, a BJP MP from Jharkhand, whether the residents near Yamuna river in Delhi are facing breathlessness due to smoke and odour emanating from the plant, the minister on March 13 stated in the Rajya Sabha that the technology used at the plant is certified as per the Rules.

Baltimore’s Solar-Powered Water Wheel Can Devour 50,000 Pounds of Harbor Trash Every Day

by Lucy Wang

inhabitat.com |

Trash isn't a pretty sight, but Baltimore's new Water Wheel actually makes collecting garbage look cool and fun. Powered by 30 solar panels and the water current, the Water Wheel Trash Inceptor can remove a whopping 50,000 pounds of trash a day--a rate that the Waterfront Partnership of Baltimore hopes will make the harbor swimmable by 2020. Designed by Clearwater Mills' John Kellett and Daniel Chase, the solar-powered trash collector generates 2,500 watts of electricity a day, which is enough energy to power the average Maryland home.

News: Chicago studio Studio Gang Architects has revealed plans to convert a decommissioned power plant in Wisconsin, USA, into new facilities for an arts college

Dezeen |

Italian architect Renzo Piano has unveiled plans to convert a power station on the banks of Moscow's Moskva river into a new venue for contemporary art.
Renzo Piano Building Workshop will transform Moscow's GES2 power station and the two hectares of grounds that surround it on its city centre plot into an exhibition space for the V-A-C Foundation, an organisation dedicated to the promotion of Russian art.

Gottlieb Paludan Architects fuels Copenhagen's ambition to become carbon-neutral by 2025

Dezeen |

Danish firm Gottlieb Paludan Architects has seen off competition from BIG, Henning Larsen Architects and 3XN to win a project designing a new biomass-fired heating and energy plant in Copenhagen.
Construction of the BIO4 unit forms part of a plan by the Danish capital to become the world's first zero-carbon city by 2025 – a project that also includes BIG's Amager Bakke Waste-to-Energy Plant, new wind farms and the now five-year-old Adelgade cooling plant.

the world's largest waste-to-energy

Danish firms Schmidt Hammer Lassen Architects and Gottlieb Paludan Architects have won a competition to design the world's largest waste-to-energy power plant in China (+ movie).
Proposed for the mountainous region on the outskirts of Shenzhen, the waste-to-energy plant is expected to incinerate 5,000 tonnes of rubbish per day – approximately one third of the waste generated by the city's 20 million inhabitants each year.

World's largest waste-to-energy plant by Schmidt Hammer Lassen and Gottlieb Palaudan

According to the architects, the facility will "utilise the most advanced technology in waste incineration and power generation".

Where is city’s garbage going?

The deadline for clearing the garbage set by the newly appointed BBMP commissioner Rajneesh Goel ended on September 3rd, 2012. But where is the garbage going, considering only Mandoor landfill is operational right now?

India gears up its waste-to-energy initiatives

Wednesday, October 30, 2013 - 15:08
Mumbai: India is all set to convert its trash to treasure as it gears up, albeit a bit slowly, to strengthen its waste-to-energy sector and boost recycling and reuse - with one expert estimating the annual earnings from biofuel alone at Rs.50,000 crore ($11 billion).
Aiding India`s transition to green technology are a host of European and American consultants with economically viable and eco-friendly solutions.

The Taj Corridor, a vast wasteland situated along the Yamuna river and lying between two world heritage monuments, the Taj Mahal and the Agra Fort, has now been reduced to a dumping ground for garbage and an unofficial burial ground for animals.

AGRA: The Taj Corridor, a vast wasteland situated along the Yamuna river and lying between two world heritage monuments, the Taj Mahal and the Agra Fort, has now been reduced to a dumping ground for garbage and an unofficial burial ground for animals.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. Is there any other Waste to Energy plant in India?

NO, the Okhla Waste to Energy facility is the first large scale integrated waste management project ever being set up in the country, aiming for a sustainable solution taking MSW through an environment friendly combustion process to generate clean and renewable energy from MSW.

As waste decomposes in a landfill, it produces methane.

Methane is a greenhouse gas, mostly emitted from decomposing waste in landfills, which is 20 – 25 times the potency of carbon dioxide and is ranked as a dangerous contributor to climate change.

Methane gases are also harmful for the ozone layer. If the ozone layer gets thinner it increases the risk of skin cancer.

Keeping waste out of landfills means more open space and less risk of leaking toxins into groundwater and releasing harmful air emissions.

The risk of ground water contamination could be a public health hazard as the groundwater could be used produce drinking water.

No methane is produced from WtE facilities, nor does the risk exists to pollute the groundwater.

Waste to Energy facilities avoid the production of methane while producing significantly more electricity from each ton of waste compared to landfills.

Further GHG reductions are realized by the avoidance of carbon emissions from long-haul transportation methods used to transport garbage to distant landfills.

Waste used as fuel in WtE facilities is typically generated in the surrounding area.

Waste to Energy facilities also recycle metal that would have otherwise been land filled. In total, creating energy from waste is simply a better solution.

Clean and Renewable Energy

Waste to Energy (WtE) is a process that takes Municipal Solid Waste (MSW), i.e. household trash, and transfers it into combustion chambers where it is burned at high temperatures and reduced to 10% of its original volume. The heat generated from the combustion chambers heats up water in steel tubes that form the walls of the combustion chambers. The water is turned to steam and sent through a turbine that continuously generates electricity.
The Waste to Energy (WtE) industry has been in existence for over 25 years and has developed state-of-the-art technology making it one of the cleanest forms of energy generation. The advanced technology in combusting waste is the air quality (emission) control system. Waste to Energy (WtE) facilities meet or exceed the strictest standards and employ a multi-step process to achieve superior environmental performance.
While recycling is a preferred first step in the waste management process, not all waste can be recycled. After recycling, there are two proven options for disposal: bury waste in a landfill or use the advanced Waste to Energy (WtE) process to turn our growing amount of trash into clean, renewable power.
WtE facilities provide communities with a clean source of power generation, minimal disturbance to surrounding neighborhoods, and a safe and effective solution for managing local trash generation. In communities where WtE facilities are located, the recycling rates are higher than the average level. WtE alleviates the reliance on landfills and the long distance shipping of trash. Re-using household waste to power generators decreases our dependence on fossil fuels and avoids the pollutants that would have been emitted in its place.

The chart shows the environment benefits in an effective way.

Salient Features of Timarpur Okhla Waste to Energy Project

Timarpur Okhla Integrated Waste processing facility offers a safe, technologically advanced means of waste disposal while also generating clean, renewable energy, reducing greenhouse gas and in particular methane gas emissions and supporting recycling through the recovery of metals and other recyclable materials;
The Okhla Waste to Energy (WtE) project is India’s first large scale Waste-to-Energy facility that aims to disposes and process 1/3^rd of the Delhi garbage and convert into the much-needed Clean Renewable Energy, enough to serving 6 lakh homes.
The project is CDM is registered with United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) for earning carbon credits.
First and largest integrated waste management project ever being set up in the country, aiming for a sustainable solution (Zero Waste Concept) taking Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) through an environmentally friendly combustion process to generate clean and renewable energy
JITF Ecopolis has won the Frost & Sullivan Excellence Awards for the “Waste to Energy Deal of the Year" for 2010 in the Municipal Waste to Energy Segment.
Sustainable solution to waste management problems
Source of clean renewable energy
Global climate benefits
Full compliance with Emission standards (“100% safe”)
Comprehensive Air Pollution Control equipment (“filters”)

Delhi's waste-to-energy plants ‘toxic, costly, inefficient’

There is a consensus that mixed trash is unsuitable for incineration, as it’s not only polluting but extremely inefficient due to its low calorific value.

NEW DELHI: Waste-to-energy incineration plants may not help Delhi deal with its massive trash problem. They may instead end up adding to its air pollution and cost the government a substantial sum.

Waste-to-energy plant likely this month

The Union Urban Development Ministry has submitted before the Standing Committee on Urban Development that a waste-to-energy plant being set up by the Delhi Power Department through the East Delhi Waste Processing Co. Ltd (EDWPCL) at the Ghazipur landfill site is now in an advanced stage of completion and the first phase of the plant is likely to become operational this month.

The filthy tale of Jawahar Nagar

Siddharth Tadepalli
| TNN | Oct 1, 2015, 09.24 AM IST

HYDERABAD: Wading through filth, flies and smoke has now become a common survival tactic for those living in the suburbs of Kapra, Keesara and Dammaiguda. Courtesy, the Jawahar Nagar dump yard that hosts the entire city's refuse. Not surprisingly then, men and women here are often found covered from head to toe while going about their routine chores. This, they confess, is the only effective way to shield themselves from the brutal onslaught of stench and insects.

Ramky Enviro to develop 40 MW waste to energy project in Hyderabad

Hyderabad, Dec. 20:

The Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation has obtained clearances for a 40 MW power plant that would use municipal solid waste generated in the city as fuel.

GASIFICATION OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE

Waste-to-energy plants based on gasification are high-efficiency power plants that utilize municipal solid waste as their fuel rather than conventional sources of energy like coal, oil or natural gas.

Salman Zafar

EarthToys Renewable Energy Article

By Salman Zafar, Renewable Energy Advisor

Introduction

The enormous increase in the quantum and diversity of waste materials and their potentially harmful effects on the general environment and public health, have led to an increasing awareness about an urgent need to adopt scientific methods for safe disposal of wastes. While there is an obvious need to minimize the generation of wastes and to reuse and recycle them, the technologies for recovery of energy from wastes can play a vital role in mitigating the problems.

Energy from Waste
How Energy from Waste (EfW) Plants Work

When waste reaches an EfW plant, it is received into a pit where an overhead crane mixes it evenly and feeds a charging hopper. The waste handling area is kept under negative air pressure to avoid the escape of dust and odour. The temperature is maintained at 850oC or above, for at least two seconds, which ensures complete combustion of the waste. Energy is recovered from the hot flue gases by a boiler system, creating steam to turn a turbo-generator which feeds the electricity grid.
Design parameters

Cost study: Incineration plant

Sewage waste must now be incinerated rather than dumped at sea. In the Mersey valley, an award-winning, state-of-the-art incineration plant sets a model for fitting this bulky new building type into its surroundings and building to a budge

At-a-glance guide
Mersey Valley Processing Centre, Widnes
Project
State-of-the-art sewage incineration plant
Client
United Utilities (formerly North West Water)
Location
Bank of River Mersey at Widnes
Project significance

Waste from landfill to be used for laying roads

TNN | Dec 29, 2015, 12.13 AM IST
New Delhi: The huge mounds of waste in Ghazipur near the capital's borders with Ghaziabad may soon disappear, if the government's plan to use treated waste for laying roads becomes a reality.

Meenakshi Sinha

The Times of India |

NOIDA: The city is all set to have a handicraft haat on the lines of Dilli haat, landfill for garbage disposal, a public auditorium for cultural activities and more. This was disclosed by RWA federation after their detailed meeting with Authority CEO Rama Raman on Monday.

The meeting that was held in sector 6 between CEO Raman and delegation of Federation of Noida Residents Welfare Associations (FONRWA) led by president N P Singh, discussed matters of essential civic issues and amenities for Noida city.

Can of worms opens up after govt composting firm sells garbage as vermicompost

Yet another garbage scam hits Bengaluru. Toxic 'vermicompost' produced by burning garbage is sold to farmers who grow food, by Karnataka Compost Development Corporation, a government firm. And this is just a tip of the iceberg!

News Desk, 28 May 2015 , Citizen Matters

Abitha Shetty (name changed), a resident of Bellandur, found her two children complaining of severe headaches all of a sudden. She had seen garbage being burnt near the school where her children study. Being conscious about air pollution, she decided to check out what is happening, as she couldn’t bear the possibility of the innocent kids suffering because of air pollution.
She, along with Lokesh, Deputy Environmental Officer, Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB), visited a spot in Choodasandra, near Chikkanayakanahalli, where she saw garbage being burnt regularly.

Major fire at Terra Firma landfill

Bengaluru: March 21, 2015, DHNS

Thick smoke engulfs five-km area near Doddaballapur

DANGEROUS: Plumes of thick smoke engulf the area around the Terra Firmalandfill nearDoddaballapur on Friday. DH PHOTO

A major fire broke out on Friday night at the Terra Firma-managed landfill near Doddaballapur in Bengaluru Rural district, where the BBMP dumps huge quantities of garbage collected from the City.
Thick smoke from the huge piles of waste engulfed an area of about five km, said the police and eye-witnesses. Over a dozen fire tenders and 10 ambulances were pressed into service to douse the fire and rescue the residents of Gundlahalli located near the landfill.

Norton Incinerator Specifications by John W. Norton, P.E., B.C.E.E.

environmentalengineering.net |

Norton Engineering has developed over the years a complete design for a large municipal incineration system with energy recovery. Mr. Norton personally designed and built two such systems, one with energy recovery and one without, and operated both of these systems for more than four years.

Costs and benefits of India's waste disposal options

downtoearth.org.in |

In December 2006, the Municipal Corporation of Kochi came up with a rather ingenious way of disposing its garbage loading it on to trucks and sending it to remote villages in neighbouring districts; even neighbouring states. A contractor was granted permission to transport the waste at the rate of Rs 1,365 a tonne. The municipal corporation didn't bother to ask the contractor about the dumping site, or whether he had obtained no-objection certificates from villages where the dumping was to happen.

India is planning to burn more of its trash to generate badly needed electricity. But as the case of a waste-to-energy plant in New Delhi shows, critics are worried about lax air pollution controls and the impact of incineration on people who eke out a living picking through waste dumps.

by david ferris

yale.edu |

For years, Sujata Das has started her workday by climbing to the top of the Okhla landfill in New Delhi to wait for the dump trucks. As they have rolled in and dispensed their loads, she and hundreds of other ragpickers have sifted through the garbage by hand, looking for plastic, paper, and scrap metal that could be sold for recycling. For her labors, Das used to earn about 5,000 rupees ($80) a month, enough to feed her three children and send them to school.

Then, two years ago, the contents of the dump trucks abruptly changed.

Can incinerators help manage India's growing waste management problem?

Hari Pulakkat, ET BureauApr 28, 2015, 10.12AM IST

timesofindia-economictimes |

The plant has been controversial right from the beginning, with residents complaining about foul smell and fly ash. It is run by the Timarpur-Okhla Waste Management Company (part of the Jindal Saw Group), and has the capacity to process about 1400 tonnes of waste per day. It was built at a cost of Rs 290 crore. The current Delhi government has promised closure of the plant, but things have not moved after chief minister Kejriwal's promise soon after he was sworn in. It is hard for the government to close the plant, as it would mean confronting an additional 1400 tonnes of garbage every day, apart from having to deal with other legal and administrative issues.