Workers in hats and boots stand beside a big machine, while a few stand in a corner sipping hot tea. Hard to believe that they are working inside a shed where 450 tonnes of garbage from the city is being segregated by a machine ahead of it being processing.
For the past 20 days, each day 450 tonnes of garbage has been sent to the waste processing plant at Chigaranahalli in Doddaballapur taluk. MSGP Infratech Pvt. Ltd. established the plant on 15 acres of land.
With deadline to stop sending garbage from the city to Mandur landfill round the corner, Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is banking on this unit to take some load and set an example for other such units to emulate. By November-end, this unit will be able to process around 500 tonnes of waste every day, officials said.
According to project manager Pushkar, for the first time, composting is being done in a closed shed. Waste is segregated using machines and wet waste is then composted. The leachate is used to hasten the composting process. “Waste is composted on a concrete floor, so there is no leachate contamination. The waste that is not composted is first segregated manually. Plastic, glass and metals are recycled, while the remaining waste is converted into Retrieved Derived Fuel (RDF) that is sold to factories,” he said.
Mohan Lal, BBMP’s Assistant Executive Engineer, told The Hindu that a scientific landfill to dispose of the inert material was being set up. The unit has been established as per the Municipal Solid Waste Rules, 2000 and norms of the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board. There is no habitation in the three-km radius around the landfill.
BBMP sources said the unit has been set up at Chigaranahalli in just three months’ time. “Since the composting and all other activities happen inside a shed, there is no stench. The unit can be scaled up, if required, in future to process more waste,” sources added.
