Er. Vinod Kumar
Chief Seattle, the great American ecologist has once said,
” We do not inherit the earth from our parents;
we borrow it from our children.”
More than 30 years ago, the United Nations General Assembly took an important step in promoting the idea that everyone deserves a decent place to live. It declared that the first Monday of October every year would be celebrated as World Habitat Day throughout the world. It was first celebrated in 1986. Apart from throwing light on the state of our cities, towns and villages, it also aims to remind the world of it’s collective responsibilities for the habitat of future generations. Every year a theme is selected for World Habitat Day. This year the theme selected is Municipal Solid Waste Management.
Waste
Waste is any unwanted or unusable material which is discarded after primary use, or is worthless, defective and of no use. Examples include municipal solid waste (household trash/ garbage/ refuse), hazardous waste, wastewater (such as sewage), surface runoff, radioactive waste and others.
Municipal Solid Waste
Municipal solid waste (MSW) includes household waste, commercial waste, and demolition waste. Household waste, commonly known as trash, garbage, rubbish or refuse is a waste consisting of everyday items that are discarded by the public. It includes food waste, plastic waste, etc. Commercial waste consists of waste from premises used mainly for the purposes of a trade or business or for the purpose of sport, recreation, education or entertainment, but excluding household, agricultural or industrial waste. Demolition waste is waste of debris from demolition/destruction of buildings, roads, bridges, or other structures. The major components of debris include concrete, wood, asphalt, shingles, brick, stone, clay, tile, steel, etc. There is the potential to recycle many elements of demolition waste.
Indian Scenario
India faces major environmental challenges associated with waste generation and inadequate waste collection, transport, treatment and disposal. Current systems in India cannot cope with the volumes of waste generated by an increasing urban population and these impact the environment and public health. The challenges and barriers are significant. But there are opportunities too. There is urgent need of a proper plan for sustainable solid waste management for cities in India. A priority is to move from reliance on waste dumps that offer no environmental protection, to waste management systems that retain useful resources within the economy. Waste segregation at source and use of specialized waste processing facilities to separate recyclable materials has a key role. The best example comes from Mysuru (erstwhile Mysore), a city in the southwestern state of Karnataka. This city has set the best example of solid waste management in the country. Because of the efficient solid waste management practices in the city, very little waste is sent to landfills. The focus is on segregating dry and wet waste at the source. The dry waste is further segregated into 24 different categories like bottles, tin containers, plastic bags, aluminum scrap etc. and is then sold to recyclers. The municipality also has a 200T Window Composting Facility for processing the wet waste which is turned into compost. The compost is further converted into organic manure and sold to farmers across the State. Because of the robust collection, segregation, recycling and composting system, the Centre for Science and Environment conferred clean city award to Mysuru in 2016.
Disposal of residual waste after extraction of material resources needs engineered landfill sites and/or investment in waste-to-energy facilities. The potential for energy generation from landfill via methane extraction or thermal treatment is a major opportunity but a key barrier is the shortage of qualified engineers and environmental professionals with the experience to deliver in this field.
Solid Waste Management (SWM) is a major problem for many urban local bodies (ULBs) in India, where urbanization, industrialization and economic growth have resulted in increased municipal solid waste (MSW) generation per person. Effective SWM is a major challenge in cities with high population density. Current SWM systems are inefficient, with waste having a negative impact on public health, the environment and the economy. There is urgent need to review the challenges, barriers and opportunities of waste management in India. More sustainable SWM is the need of the hour.
Scenario in J&K State
The Swatch Bharat Mission (Urban) has a special mention about preparation of Detailed Project Reports (DPRs) for management of solid waste across cities and towns of India. According to a survey done in the recent past, except Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) and Jammu Municipal Corporation (JMC) most of the local bodies that include Municipal Councils and Municipal Committees/Town Area Committees (TAC) have not prepared proper DPR’s as per Solid Waste Management Rules 2016. This has added to the problems of managing solid waste in towns across J&K. In almost all the towns of J&K state, local municipalities have failed to scientifically treat the waste. The waste is either thrown into water-bodies, hill-sides or forest areas. A report submitted before National Green Tribunal (NGT) only a few years back had revealed that J&K state has 100 percent open dumping of Municipal Solid Waste by SMC, JMC and all the Municipal Councils and Municipal Committees which are 90 plus in number. The NGT report had given 31st rank to J&K State with regard to Solid Waste Management policy. Goa, Kerala and Tamil Nadu have been ranked as 1, 2 and 3 respectively keeping in view the scientific management of solid waste.
It is worthwhile to mention that recently JMC and SMC have started a pilot activity in some areas to undertake door to door collection of garbage and segregation at source. JMC in association with a private solid waste management organization is executing this pilot project in Jammu town. For this purpose coloured dustbins have been provided to the households. They have been advised to put biodegradable waste in green dustbin and non biodegradable waste in blue dustbin. The waste is collected by the workers of JMC on daily basis in hand driven trolleys/load carriers for further shifting to the dumping sites. In an environmentally fragile state of Jammu and Kashmir compositing units do not exists (except one in Budgam district).
There is definitely a large scope for improvement in the situation within the constraints of available resources. Every street vendor should keep suitable containers for storage of waste generated during the course of his activity and deposit such waste at waste storage container as notified by the local authority. It is of utmost importance that door to door collection of garbage and its source segregation is made mandatory across the State. There is need for the creation of an enabling environment through legal and institutional changes, public participation, capacity building and various other innovative practices for MSWM in J&K in order to realize the dream of clean society for all. The institutions as well as the public have to work in a synergy and contribute towards a cleaner J&K state.
(The author is Assistant Engineer (Mech.) Stores Procurement Deptt. Jammu)
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