Secunderabad Cantonment Board (SCB)’s garbage disposal woes are likely to end with a private company seeking clearance from Pollution Control Board to establish a garbage-to-power factory near Vantimamidi. Rudram Constructions and Power Private Limited had approached SCB early this year with the waste-to-power project. It had even offered to pay Rs.1 lakh per month to the Board for transporting garbage to its factory.
“The site near Vantimamidi on the Rajiv Rahadari is about 40 km away from Secunderabad. We are expecting clearance from the PCB in a week,” said an official of Rudram Constructions and Power Private Limited.
Close to 120 tonnes of garbage is generated everyday by the SCB which it has been transporting to the GHMC’s Jawaharnagar dump yard for the last couple of years after the PCB halted garbage dumping at Hashmathpet.
Tipping charges
But, the cosy arrangement ran into problems when the GHMC demanded Rs.720 per tonne of garbage to be paid as tipping charges and also pay the same to Ramky Enviro Engineers, implementing the integrated municipal solid waste management project.
SCB authorities had reservations about the same and when its trucks were not allowed to dump garbage at Jawaharnagar was forced to take recourse to using a site at Turkapally and Hasmathpet.
Yet, when local residents opposed the dumping on health grounds, the SCB invited tenders from private parties to dispose off its garbage following which Rudram Constructions was chosen.
“We have issued a letter of intent to the company. A final agreement will be signed once it obtains PCB’s approval,” said SCB Chief Executive Officer S. Balakrishna. The firm began paying garbage transportation cost and so far Rs. 4 lakh was paid, he added.
