At present urban Indians generate 100, 000 tonnes of wastes per day. Mantra to govern waste is to reduce and manage this waste in a sustainable manner. But Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) has chosen an unsustainable and hazardous technology route to manage its waste. It has entered into an agreement which facilitates toxic technology transfer in Mumbai. The proposed Waste To Energy (WTE) plant in Gorai dumping ground is based on gasification technology for the disposal of 1, 000 metric tonnes (MT) of waste per day. Its an instance of one more potential toxic blast akin to the promotion of Bhopalfs Union Carbide disaster. It is claimed that the plant will cost over Rs 242 crore and will generate 21 MW of electricity.
Gasification is an incineration process which emits dioxins, the most poisonous cancer causing toxin known in the world. (See: Health Effects of Dioxins) In such a scenario where India neither has standards nor the technical facilities to monitor and analyse these dioxin emissions, the MCGM has signed an agreement with Energy Developments Limited India (EDL), a subsidiary of Australian Company to generate electricity from waste. They intend to dispose off waste and recover electricity through the companyfs "pressure cooker" technology which it terms as Solid Waste Recycling Facility (SWERF).
According to a senior MCGM official who deals with soild waste management, the electricity will be sold at the rate of Rs 3.50 per unit. The plant has been given 7.33 hectares of land on lease for 20 years in Gorai. In order to get this project implemented, Union Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy (MNES) will provide subsidy at the rate of 150 crore for Rs 500 crore. The waste will be provided by MCGM. The Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) is being finalised, adds the MCGM official on the condition of anonymity, unmindful of the high cost involved in terms of health and environment of Mumbai.
Its claim that the plant will eliminate the need for dumping ground is also false. Where will the plant disposed off the ash? The plant will use plastics, paper and other materials after separating glasses and other inert materials. Encouraging unsegregated waste, which contains plastics and chlorinated material, is unlawful. Setting up an incinerator plant like this in Gorai, which is a Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ), violates CRZ notification, says Debi Goenka of Bombay Environmental Action Group.
Itfs surprising why Timarpur failure in Delhi in waste to energy (WTE) has not taught any lessons to MNES and Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai. In the Timarpur case, (this waste to energy plant ran for only seven days and now it lies defunct) recently Delhi High Court has asked Comptroller and Auditor General to probe the deal. Despite such a track record MNES is busy facilitating toxic technology transfer in India in general and metropolitan cities in particular. While it is a well-known fact that there is not even one viable demonstration project anywhere in the country, initiatives are being taken for commercial venture. Ignoring the recommendations of Supreme Court, MNES is promoting pyrolysis/gasification and incineration processes to deal with waste and promote WTE.
About 23-30 percent sand and inert materials are present in the Indian urban waste which is difficult to separate. The technology diagram shown by EDL does not show as to how they will segregate it. WTE encourages waste generation and maximisation, informs Dr N K Bansal, Centre for Energy Studies, IIT Delhi.
In UK, under the Government's Renewable Obligation, the gasification of fossil-fuel based wastes cannot be classified as Renewable Energy, as the fossil-fuel based waste resources are destroyed, instead of being recycled. The gasifiers also destroy all the paper, card and kitchen waste in our domestic waste, instead of recycling and composting. European Union Incineration directive prohibits such processes because they are major sources of dioxins emission. Solid experts world over say, material recovery is the most appropriate and ecological method to deal with low calorific value waste.
EDL India, in reality, is an Australian company, named Energy Developments Limited (EDL). The company will use its Solid Waste Energy Recycling Facility (SWERF), a gasification process for this purpose. This is a technology of its subsidiary Brightstar Environmental. The subsidiary was formed after buying 88 percent of SWERF shares from US based Brighstar Synfuel Corporation in 1995. There are unconfirmed reports of this company being related to Enron. The agreement signed by MCGM and EDL is confidential, say MCGM officials and is thus inaccessible even to media persons and researchers. When asked and informed about the dangers of this technology, A M Gor, Chief Engineer, Solid Waste Management, MCGM says, "I can file a case against those who ask for minutes of the agreements", ensuring a veil of secrecy around the details of the project.
The worldfs first and only SWERF is located in Australia, at Wollongong, New South Wales. The SWERF plant had been operating on a trial basis since early February 2001. At full capacity, it is claimed that it can process a maximum up to 150,000 tonnes of household waste annually or a mere 400 m tonnes per day, which will produce enough electricity for approximately 24,000 households. The plant is currently shut down due to what they call a technical glitch in their nameplate capacity testing. As a consequence their stock fell 35 cents to 5. 99 dollars its shares have fallen because of yet another delay in its SWERF project, reported Australian Financial Review and Fairfax release on 29 January 2002 and continues to fall until reports last received. EDL has recently applied for a two-year extension to their operating license. The plant has broken emission limits on arsenic, sulphur dioxide, carbon monoxide and sulphuric acid mist. The West Australian Government has recently banned Brightstar from building this plant near residential areas and schools in Maddington, West Australia.
The Maharashtra State Electricity Board (MSEB) and companies like Tata and others ought not buy electricity from these polluting and experimental waste to energy incinerators, says Bittu Sahgal, editor, Sanctuary Asia. Contrary to what Ministry of Non-conventional Energy Sources (MNES) and MCGM will have us believe, gasification of waste from fossil fuels is not a renewable form of energy, as the recyclable products are not recycled, but gasified instead. It is untrue that gasification is not incineration, when all directives clearly say it is. Under the Waste Incineration Directive by the European Union as well as classifaction of the UK Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, gasification is merely another form of incineration. The company's only plant does not meet EU emission limits in its plant. In fact, both the processes are high temperature thermal processes, with similar emission and impacts, though of varying magnitudes. The release of such chemicals is poisonous to the vegetation and soil environment.
The advocates of the project claim that no segregation of the plastics from the garbage is required. This not only violates the Municipal Solid Wastes (Management Handling) (MSW) Rules 2000, which stipulates segregation, and promotes recycling of "recoverable resources" but also preempts segregation and recycling efforts being made by municipalities and communities around the country. Moreover, municipal wastes contains a number of toxic materials including household insecticides, heavy metals like lead, mercury present in batteries, fluorescent bulbs and tubes, which will be released into the environment during gasification process. Technologies like gasification are a form of incineration and have all the harmful contaminants of a MSW incinerator, says Dr Bansal. According to the MSW Rules, 2000, it is illegal to incinerate chlorinated plastics (like PVC) and wastes chemically treated with any chlorinated disinfectant. Incineration transfers the hazardous characteristics of waste from the solid form to air, water and ash. It also releases new toxins of new ones, which were previously not present in the original waste stream, besides making others like heavy metals mobile and more leachable.
The problem starts with the generation of waste, therefore, any solution to be successful for waste management must pay attention at the source, instead of end of pipe processes like incineration and gasification, avers Dr Amiya Sahu, chairman, ECON Pollution Control Private Limited. "So long as the composition of Indian waste remains what it is with ashes and plastics, Timarpur experiment will remain relevant contrary to what Sunand Sharma, Managing Director, EDL India will have us believe," adds Dr Bansal. Sunand Sharma says, his SWERF technology will preempt use of landfills and thereby leaching" but he himself suggests landfills for the disposal of ashes. "Actually this is yet another instance of ignoring environment and public health effects that imperils the citizens well being. The gasification based Waste to Energy technology is a failed technology," says Ravi Agarwal, an environmentalist from Srishti, a non governmental organisation. The possibility of the replication of Timarpur blunder in Gorai is against ecological wisdom and even sound business sense. The tall claim of its non-polluting nature is not verified by scientific facts.
Ash and suspended particulate matter which emerge from the combustion technologies is a huge perpetual problem because although there is volume reduction of waste through this technique, the management of ever growing ash remains, says Dr D N Rao, Environment Economist from Jawharlal Nehru University. Those who say that gasification is not incineration simply indulge in jugglery of words, adds Rao. Trusting Mumbai's waste to such an unproven technology with 1, 000 mt per day, is fraught with dangers. It is even more disturbing that the company is being awarded such projects, when it has failed to deliver in its own plant of even 400 mt per day. The current available data from these proposed plants now are insufficient to establish whether gasification would reduce emissions. The tars and volatile gases are not re-circulated as feed for cracking. The release of such chemicals is poisonous to the vegetation and soil environment.
According to the members of the Indian Government's four members Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) which visited the Wollongong plant in March 2000, most information sharing was inadequate by the company. Also the degree of documentation needed to support the development was stated to be unavailable or not forthcoming. In this context "it would not be possible for me to make strong recommendations in favor of the technology," said Professor H S Mukunda, a member of the FFM. EDL's objective to have 15 of its projects constructed and running by June next year is unrealistic due to technical immaturity says George Marias, Burdett Buckerdige Young analyst.
MCGM is providing free land and waste to this technology which will also put public money at risk. The project is likely to fail as even the latest report suggests and itfs a question of the health and environment of the Mumbai residents. It is inadvisable to adopt such an untested technology for a developing country where basic testing facilities do not even exist. An avoidance route of using simple and safe approaches has been widely accepted and promoted by all waste experts in the country, adds Agarwal. In the case to the proposed MCGM contract, there has been no public consultation at any stage. In fact the technology must undergo a thorough evaluation and proper environment impact assessment of the project before any execution of such a project takes place. The fact that EDL's own plant is not even operating as of now continuing with the flawed agreement is beyond any rationality. Further contrary to Schedule IV of the Municipal Solid Waste Rules, 2000, the signatories of the agreement have not sought any approval from the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) or Central Pollution Control Board, as is mandatory. We have not authorized any such plant in Goarai, says Dr Munshi Lal Gautam, Member Secretary, MPCB.
It is surprising that the technology advisory committee set up under the ministry of urban affairs and development, monitoring technologies like incineration, densification, gasification etc. has no knowledge about the installation of this technology. In fact, the chairman of the committee, P U Asnani does not recommend incineration and gasification projects in his report titled Modernisation of Solid Waste Management Practices. According to his report brought out in May 1999, "corporations should not experiment with any such expensive technology until after adequate experimentation and one or two successful pilot projects. That too only after they have been approved by the MNES, Ministry of Environment and Forests and Ministry of Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation or any agency identified by the government of India, certifying it proven for adoption".
The corporations should desist from promoting such unviable and hazardous technologies. Economically, buy back of the very expensive electricity produced by the plant would tantamount to a subsidy in perpetuity and in any case Enron experiment has shown that costly electricity is socially irrelevant, says Rao. Having witnessed Timarpur blunder, we should go for viable and sustainable alternatives like Recycling and Composting as suggested by Burman Committee. Biomethanation is also an alternative as is being undertaken by United Nations Developments Programme in place of waste to energy way of waste reduction which promotes precious material recovery. The promotion of such waste to energy technologies amounts to dumping of untested technology into India.
Whenever the colossal problem of Indian garbage is debated, the issue which is discussed is what to choose: the route to sustainable material recovery or unsustainable energy recovery. Financially and environmentally the methodologies involving resource recovery, recycling and reuse would be helpful. In a tropical country like India, biological and biochemical processes like composting and vermi-composting would be suitable because of apt ambient conditions, low capital and maintenance cost, says S V Mapuskar, Advisor, Sanitaion and Bioenergy, Maharashtra Smarak Nidhi, Pune, suggesting a cost effective technologies for waste management.
Health effects of Dioxins
Dioxin is no more a western problem, two recent studies based on samples of India have detected high levels of dioxins in breast milk, human tissues etc. Short-term exposure of human to high levels of dioxins may result in skin lesions, such as chloracne and patchy darkening of the skin, and altered liver function. Long-term exposure is linked to impairment of the immune system, the developing nervous system, the endocrine system and reproductive functions. Chronic exposure of animals to dioxins has resulted in several types of cancer, according to World Health Orgainisation. (for futher details visit websites: www.toxicslink.org, www.greenpeace.org.au/toxics/archive/ dioxin/POPS_health.html, www.epa.gov/ncea/dioxin.htm ) Dioxin is formed as an unintentional by-product of many industrial processes involving chlorine such as waste incineration, chemical and pesticide manufacturing and pulp and paper bleaching. Dioxin was the primary toxic component of Agent Orange, was found at Love Canal in Niagara Falls, NY and was the basis for evacuations at Times Beach, MO and Seveso Italy. Dioxin is formed by burning chlorine-based chemical compounds with hydrocarbons. The major source of dioxin in the environment (95%) comes from incinerators burning chlorinated wastes. Dioxin pollution is also affiliated with paper mills which use chlorine bleaching in their process and with the production of Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) plastics.
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