Now, a machine that can process wet waste in four hours!

As the city continues to face mounting garbage issues, a private company in cooperation with the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), has installed a machine that can process wet municipal waste in a matter of two to four hours.

The company, Indo-Japan venture JERS Environment Technologies Pvt. Ltd., claims it to be the first such machine in the city. The company, which is the Indian marketing business arm of Japan Environment Recycling System INC., has started a high speed aerobic waste processing machine at the BBMP Solid Waste Processing Centre in Koramangala on Thursday. Minister Ramalinga Reddy oversaw the first operation of the machine.

The Solid Waste Management committee under the BBMP is keen to get new ideas implemented vis a vis waste disposal. "We are open to all kinds of new ideas in which waste processing can be done at the local level. We are trying to get those incorporated," said Subodh Yadav, Special Commissioner, Solid Waste Management, BBMP, adding that the department would take it forward after seeing the results.

“Unlike conventional anaerobic composting, this machine can process waste in two to four hours," said Gnana Prakash Anthony, marketing manager at JERS. The machine quickens the process by fermenting waste in a vacuum-sealed container with temperatures controlled at 60 degrees Celsius by allowing steam into the vault. Locally available microbes are used to quicken the process. The system can be used not just for municipal waste, but even for other industries which generate large amount of wet waste, such as slaughterhouses, fisheries, etc.

The machine processes 400 kg in one cycle and is capable of processing four tonnes a day, a small number compared to around 40 tonnes of waste generated by each ward in a day. The temperature and moisture removal can be controlled externally, depending on the nature of the waste being processed. Once processed, the end products are compost and the non-biodegradable part of the waste (like plastic bags or unsegregated dry waste along with fibrous material like paper), which can be incinerated.

"Wet waste usually takes 10 to 15 days to decompose," said Arif Ahmed, operations manager of the Kasa Rasa waste processing unit, an initiative of the non governmental organisation Saahas, which functions from the same compound.