Brahmapuram biomedical waste treatment plant a non-starter

KEIL to soon commission district’s first biomedical waste treatment plant at Ambalamedu

The proposal for a new biomedical waste treatment plant that was supposed to have been set up at Brahmapuram by Indian Medical Association Goes Eco-Friendly (IMAGE) is at a standstill.

The paperwork had made no progress after the land was allotted to IMAGE last year, said Dr. Abraham Varghese, former IMA State president. The proposed project was to have come up on around three acres of land at Brahmapuram, near the Kochi Corporation’s dumping yard, but a lease agreement for the land has not yet been finalised.

“The possession document issued to IMAGE last year for the land says that the land belongs to the Kochi Corporation, but it was the State government that allotted the land. This created a confusion,” said IMAGE secretary Dr. Sharafudheen K.P. A meeting chaired by the Chief Secretary would soon be held to resolve the issue, he added.

When the Corporation Council had refused to hand the land over to IMAGE last year, the government had asked the District Collector to step in and handle the takeover.

The estimated cost of the project is ₹20-23 crore, and the plant will have an initial capacity to treat 20 tonnes, which can be expanded to 30 tonnes. A detailed project report had been submitted to the State Pollution Control Board for sanction, said Dr. Sharafudheen. The municipal waste lying on the allotted land will have to be biomined before the project can begin.

Meanwhile, the State’s only operational biomedical waste treatment facility in Palakkad, managed by IMAGE, has expanded its capacity to handle waste, considering the large quantities that have been arriving at the plant from COVID care centres. Around 60 tonnes of waste is taken to the plant daily, from COVID care facilities and other centres such as laboratories and palliative care centres. The plant had the capacity to treat 37 tonnes daily. It has recently been enhanced to around 55.8 tonnes to handle the higher load.

The quantity of waste coming to the plant from COVID centres has fallen compared to the earlier phases of the pandemic. Around 130 first-line treatment centres (FLTCs) were closed across the State when the premises began to be used for other purposes, bringing the quantity of COVID-related waste down from an earlier figure of around 25 tonnes daily to around 16 tonnes at present, said Dr. Sharafudheen.

While the IMAGE facility waits to take off, the district will soon get its first functional biomedical waste treatment plant at Ambalamedu. The plant, set up by Kerala Enviro Infrastructure Limited (KEIL), would have a capacity of 16 tonnes per day and would be commissioned by the end of the month, said N.K. Pillai, CEO of KEIL. The plant, set up at a cost of ₹14 crore, would be able to treat waste from Ernakulam, Alappuzha, Kottayam, Pathanamthitta, Idukki and Thrissur districts, he said. While most health centres were already registered with IMAGE for biomedical waste collection, the government would have to make arrangements to ensure that some of waste was sent to the new KEIL facility to relieve the burden on the centre at Palakkad, added Mr. Pillai.

KEIL is a public limited company that has been treating hazardous waste from industrial units since 2008.