Garbage? Not in my backyard, says Bangalore

Garbage? Not in my backyard, says Bangalore

Divya Gandhi

With the city generating 3,000 tonnes of garbage a day, its disposal has thrown up several issues

Largest component of garbage is household waste

Domestic waste must be segregated at the locality level

— Photo: K Gopinathan

Mounting problem: There is a need for the BBMP to come up with guidelines and infrastructure to get residential areas and welfare associations to manage organic waste.

Bangalore: The Forest Department bemoans the danger to wildlife in the Bannerghatta National Park from mounting garbage. At the other end of the city, the Air Force Station, Yelahanka, voices concern over aircraft safety that is now compromised by the increasing bird activity around open dumpsites nearby. If these complaints come from unexpected quarters, the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) gets at least four complaints every week from residents in the city about problems of municipal waste.

A comprehensive study of solid waste generation in Bangalore conducted in 2004 by H. Lakshmikantha of KSPCB found that 1,500 tonnes of waste is generated every day that has no fewer than 60 unauthorised dumpsites. The figure now stands at over 3,000 tonnes, Mr. Lakshmikantha told The Hindu. The largest component of this garbage, the study found, was not industrial waste or that from commercial establishments, but household waste. As much as 74 per cent of this is biodegradable.

However, the BBMP’s solution to mounting garbage crisis in the form of three mega waste-to-energy projects outsourced to private companies can only be a short-term one, according to environmentalists and experts, and one potentially riddled with problems.

Out of our backyards but into villages in and around Mavallipura, Mandur and Doddabalapur, the garbage will be segregated, treated and converted into energy at the project sites. “When these sites start functioning at full capacity, 90 per cent of Bangalore’s garbage problems will be solved,” says U.A. Vasanth Rao, Joint Commissioner (Health) at BBMP. Together, they will have the capacity to compost or incinerate 2,500 tonnes of garbage a day, he said.

However the cracks are already beginning to show.

Transporting Bangalore’s garbage from one end of the city to another has thrown up a whole set of unforeseen issues. A land dispute is preventing the Mavallipura project from running to its full capacity, according to B.C. Sharma, vice-president of Ramky Enviro Engineers, the company that is developing the project.
Trouble

The Doddabalapur project (given to Terra Firma Biotechnologies Ltd.) is running into trouble with protests by residents of the Doddabalamangala village, who do not want a convoy of 100 trucks passing through their village every day. In fact, truck contractors have asked the BBMP for “police protection.” The residents are also concerned that the ground water in the village will be polluted, Mr. Rao says.

“Why should village residents have to deal with the city’s garbage just because we do not want it in our backyard?” asks Wilma Rodrigues’ founder-member of Saahas, a non-governmental organisation that deals with solid waste management. While these projects might solve some of the issues of unauthorised dumping, Ms. Rodrigues says it makes little sense to have the solid waste management plants so far away. “Most of the expenditure on waste disposal goes in transport costs. If organic waste is sorted and composted at the point of generation, it will take care of 50 to 80 per cent of the garbage quantum.”
Segregation of waste

The BBMP should instead implement the Municipal Solid Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules to get residential localities to segregate and compost domestic waste, she says.

“The BBMP can save a large part of its Rs. 100-crore expenditure on waste collection and disposal if it gets localities to compost waste themselves. Many areas, such as Kalyanagar, have shown the way,” she said.