Hindustan Times  22.09.2010

Even as Mumbaiites gear up for the big immersion day on Wednesday, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has asked citizens to deposit only certain kind of offerings in the Nirmalaya Kalash. The civic body, which is expecting 3,000 metric tones (mt) of nirmalaya, wants to ensure that the city’s composting mechanism doesn’t malfunction.

The appeal from the BMC comes after they have previously found golden articles, ornaments and currency coins unwittingly deposited by enthusiastic devotees in the kalash. And, then there is more than 200mt of plastic that devotees deposit as nirmalaya every single year.

To manage the humongous amount of waste generated after immersions, BMC has opened three additional centers for nirmalaya composting in the city this year. In all, the city would now have 14 centres.

“Every ward in the city has designated centres and trucks, where the collected nirmalaya will be taken for composting. But, since there is no awareness about what exactly nirmalaya is, we end up spending more time and energy simply segregating the waste,” said a civic official. According to a worker from the segregation site in TB Hospital at Sewri, people often dump thermocol and wooden canopies, and plastic cups and bags in the kalash. “People deposit all kinds of decorative items, making our job tougher,” said the worker.

BP Patil, chief engineer, solid waste management (SWM), said, “This festival is a good time for people to initiate segregation of wastes and offer the nirmalaya into the kalash accordingly. This will help us in composting the nirmalaya more efficiently.”

The civic body also plans to have an additional 1,100 vehicles only for waste collection on the immersion day. These vehicles will make about 2,000 trips to various collection points across the city to pick up nirmalaya and other waste.

The bright side, however, to the whole exercise is that the BMC generates at least 500 tonnes of compost from the nirmalaya. This compost is used as a natural fertilizer in most civic gardens across the city.

The Times of India       20.09.2010

HYDERABAD: The much-hyped Integrated Solid Waste Management project being taken up by the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) is in limbo with independent engineer of the project, Environment Protection Training and Research Institute (Eptri) rejecting the proposed plan of implementation of the project in a phased manner.

The project developer, Ramky Enviro Engineers Limited, had said it would take up the project in a phased manner. In the first phase, it would confine to collection and transportation of garbage generated in East and West zones of the city. It would start treatment and disposal of the waste only after a couple of years after completion of the plant and other works. However, Eptri experts said collection, transportation, treatment and disposal have to be taken up simultaneously as per the agreement entered between the GHMC and Ramky for the project.

Eptri, which has been acting as the independent engineer for the project, reportedly informed its decision to GHMC commissioner Sameer Sharma a couple of days ago. "The corporation has received a letter from the Eptri, which is being examined to take a decision on the project," a senior official of the corporation said.

Eptri informed that the concession, payment of tipping fee of Rs 1,431 per tonne would come into effect only if treatment and disposal was done along with other works.

On the other hand, Ramky's argument is bifurcation of tipping fee to take up the project in a phased manner. Of the total tipping fee, 40 per cent fee is for collection and transportation of solid waste, 20 per cent for transporting of garbage from transfer stations to processing stations (dumping yards) and remaining 40 per cent for treatment and disposal.

The Rs 434-crore solid waste management project is being taken up by the GHMC under Public Private Partnership (PPP) mode. The project time is for 25 years and Ramky is also responsible for post-closure maintenance of land fill facility for a period of 15 years.

Though Ramky and GHMC had entered into an agreement in February 2008, the project implementation was kept in abeyance for over a year due to objections and concerns raised by municipal workers. As per the agreement, the collection and transportation of garbage should begin within 180 days from the date of agreement and treatment and disposal of the waste has to begin within two years of the agreement.

Now, again the project hit a roadblock with objections raised by Eptri.