The Corporation is pushing hard the concept of managing
waste at source by the citizens as no alternative has yet been found to
the Vilappilsala plant and installation of new garbage treatment plants.

The
civic body had found part success in implementing the idea with
apartments, hotels, and households installing compost units and biogas
plants on their premises to treat solid waste.

Data
available with Corporation officials revealed that 120 apartments had
installed compost units with a capacity to process 50 kg to 100 kg of
solid waste per day. The units installed by government-approved service
providers were eligible for a subsidy of Rs.500 per unit, said an
official.

As many as 226 houses had set up small
biogas plants and the gas generated was being used to meet a part of
their cooking needs. The plants had the capacity to process 2.5kg to 7.5
kg of waste per day and the Corporation offered a 75 per cent subsidy,
the official said.

After the subsidy, a household would need to spend Rs.2,000 to set up the plant, the official said.

“The
cost involved is a hindrance in pushing the idea. But the feedback we
get is that those who installed the biogas plants manage to marginally
reduce the dependence on LPG,” he added. Among the hoteliers, the
concept of setting up biogas plants was slowly catching up with around
60 hotels in the city already installing the facility, the official
said.

In the scheme of things that formed part of the
civic body’s decentralised garbage management plan, the pipe compost
was the most ambitious.

After rolling out the scheme,
50,000 pipe compost units had been installed in houses, but, of late,
the scheme was getting less patronage. At present, the requests for
application have come down from 1,000 to 200 a week, the official said.

The
programme lost its sheen after residents complained of slow decay of
garbage and sighting of worms inside pipe composts. In certain areas,
the Corporation tried inoculation but it did not find much success as it
needed a minimum moisture for the garbage to decay. The programme was
but running well in Chettivilakkara ward, which was one of the first
areas in the city to experiment with pipe compost.

Around
3,000 residents in Chettivilakkara hade installed pipe compost units
and in a few months all houses in the ward would be provided the
facility.

The residents there dumped small quantities of mud inside the pipe and that facilitated easy decay, the official said.

Mayor K. Chandrika told
The Hindu
that 10 biogas plants had been installed in government schools, markets,
and public places. The civic body was in the process of setting up 20
more such units.

The Corporation had incurred an
expenditure of around Rs.4.30 crore as subsidy component towards
installing waste treatment units, she added.