Waste Management in the Time of Lockdown

Making Waste Managment More Resilient to Disruptions

Reduced industrial production, vehicular traffic, and construction sharply reduced pollution sources during lockdown.

But reports say that waste from households sharply increased. 

In the UK, there is a 300% increase in reported illegal dumping of waste in rural communities.
 

In some ways, COVID-19 is having an impact on waste management and negatively affecting the environment.

Nearly half the recycling facilities in the UK have reduced or stopped treatment. Industries that rely heavily on recycled materials are therefore the ones feeling the most pressure in terms of getting hold of resources.

Many countries are now in the process of transitioning to a future management system based on the “circular economy”, where the aim is to reuse and return all waste material to manufacturers as a resource. 

Circularity reduces the need to extract new resources, decreases the environmental impacts associated with mining, lowers costs and helps us to meet climate and environment targets. Current waste management systems will need to evolve to be resilient in the face of shocks like the current pandemic.

Crucial Tool to Safeguard Public Health - Waste management

A World Bank newsletter in Apr 2020 said : Waste management is an invaluable public health service, especially during the current coronavirus pandemic. Those of us privileged enough to have formal or informal waste management services right now are benefiting tremendously from avoiding the health risks of waste piling up.

Even when the Covid-19 crisis ends, waste management will remain a crucial tool to safeguard public health and provide livelihoods.

Contrast between High and Low Income Countries

Unfortunately, over 90% of waste is openly dumped or burned in low-income countries. Poorly managed waste is contaminating our water bodies, clogging drains and causing flooding, transmitting disease, increasing respiratory problems from burning, harming animals that consume waste unknowingly, and affecting economic development, such as through tourism. Greenhouse gasses from waste are also a key contributor to climate change. 

Upper-middle and high-income countries provide nearly universal waste collection, and more than one-third of waste is recovered through recycling and composting. Low-income countries collect about 48% of waste in cities, but only 26% in rural areas - and only 4% is recycled.

Cities Overwhelmed with Accumulated Waste during Lockdown

Delhi : With three municipal corporations in Delhi facing cash crunch and a large number of sanitation workers missing from work, city residents staying indoors amid the nationwide lockdown, fear dark days ahead on the cleanliness and sanitation front. Meanwhile, residents of various Delhi areas complained of garbage piles.

Meerut : जनता कर्फ्यू के बाद से मेरठ समेत एनसीआर में हवा की सेहत सुधरने लगी थी। लेकिन अब फिर से यह श्रेणी बहुत खराब की श्रेणी में आ गई है। कई कारणों में से एक है कि लॉकडाउन के दौरान कई जगहोंपर कूड़ा जलाया जा रहा है, जिसमें पॉलीथिन भी है।

Mathura : लॉकडाउन से पहले मथुरा में श्रद्धालुओं ने कुछ घाटों पर जाल लगाकर नालों का कूड़ा रोकने की कोशिश की, लेकिन जालों पर इकट्ठा हुआ कूड़ा न उठ पाने और पानी बढ़ जाने के कारण कूड़ा फिर यमुना में पहुंच गया। इस गंदगी को रोक पाने में नगर निगम नाकाम साबित हो रहा है।

Gaziabad : सामान्य दिनों की तुलना में लॉकडाउन के दौरान गाजियाबादःकी कॉलोनियों में अधिक कूड़ा निकल रहा है. लेकिन निगम कई कॉलोनियों में कूड़ा पूरा नहीं उठा पा रहा। 

Patiala : एक हफ्ते पहले का समाचार है कि पटियाला का एयर क्वाॅलिटी इंडेक्स दिल्ली से भी ज्यादा प्रदूषित रिकाॅर्ड किया गया है। पीएम 10 और 2.5 धूल, कंस्‍ट्रक्‍शन और कूड़ा व पराली जलाने से ज्यादा बढ़ता है।

A heap of garbage at Konka Road in Ranchi
in March 2020. Picture by Manob Chowdhary in Telegraph

Ranchi : The coronavirus pandemic and the resultant lockdown have hit Ranchi’s civic services. “No safai worker has collected garbage from my house for the past one week. The foul smell has become unbearable now", a resident said.

Goa : Garbage has been piling up along the popular coastal belt in Goa. 

Ahmedabad : Trash piled up in Ahmedabad as well.

Cities that made More Effort for Waste Management During Lockdown

Bengaluru : Having anticipated waste woes during the lockdown, residents of several localities in Bengaluru are relieved at garbage being disposed of promptly. “Workers are ensuring waste is collected regularly during the lockdown. The responsibility of proper segregation lies on us,” said member of a resident welfare association.

Kerala : The Government of Kerala directed that no waste removal procedures of local self-government bodies should be interrupted amid lockdown. Panchayat director has instructed all panchayats to monitor activities of Haritha Karma Sena and submit reports.

A consultant with the Haritha Kerala Mission said that decentralising waste management is the best solution for waste disposal. "Segregation of waste is key. Plastic, biodegradable, medical waste and other-non degradable waste have to be treated separately. As per our system, biodegradable waste has to be composted in compounds in the house or in the apartment complexes."

The pandemic has made the importance of decentralised waste management even clearer to Keralites. People spoken to said that they are already seeing a reduction in illegal waste dumping, and littering in public areas in Kerala since the lockdown. People have learnt to compost their waste, rather than throwing it in some other place.

Kochi : Despite all odds, including lack of transportation and lockdown restrictions, sanitation workers in Kochi turn up for work without fail to collect waste, disinfect public spaces and ensure the city is spic and span. "If we stop working, the city will start to stink. We don’t want the people to suffer", said one worker. 

Another worker in Kochi takes care of garbage disposal, unclogs drains, disinfects roads and streets besides trimming the overgrown weeds and the trees. He says even as sanitisation works are being carried out as part of preventive measures against Covid-19, the majority of work is also done keeping in mind the upcoming monsoon season.

Engaged in collecting trash and waste from homes for the past 28 years, a third worker today struggles to make ends meet, as payments have been pending from many homes, citing lockdown as a reason. “Work starts from 3:30am and goes on till all the trash and waste, brought to the collection point, is taken by the corporation. We wait till the truck arrives and loads our sacks,” he said.

“I’m sure that if we stop our work, Kochi will stink. One cannot dump waste on public roads and there is a limit to which the corporation can organise waste-collection," said a fourth worker. 

A fifth worker is the driver of the compactor vehicle which transports garbage. He rides 110 km everyday on his motorcycle, so that Kochi doesn’t reel under garbage issue. “Since we start early in the morning, riding a motorcycle is a risky thing. So, I preferred public transport to reach Kochi. However, due to the new circumstances, that is not possible. Staying away is not an option as a reluctance on my part can affect the waste movement here,” he says. Interestingly, he has been working continuously for the last 30 days. “Some people can’t make it to work. So, I do their job too,” he adds. 

Trichy : A study on sanitation workers in Coimbatore and Tiruchirappalli in April 2020, found that a large majority said that society will view sanitation workers with dignity after lockdown. “People have started to respect us solely for the work we do, the same work for which we were looked down for years,” said a sanitation worker from Tiruchirapalli.

Chandigarh : Even when Chandigarh is on lockdown and residents are confined to the walls of their houses because of the fear of coronavirus spread, the 2,500-strong brigade of door-to-door garbage collectors is doing their job relentlessly, without giving it a day’s skip. 

“It is the time to show the society that we, too, care for them. If we don’t pick the garbage during the curfew period, the piled up garbage will start spreading infections,” says the head of the door-to-door garbage collectors’ society.

Bhiwadi has a Long way to go to Improve Waste Managment

भिवाड़ी में गीला और सूखा कचरा को अलग-अलग करने से बच रही नगर परिषद पर एनजीटी ने कुछ माह पूर्व सख्ती दिखाते हुए विशेषकर डोर टू डोर कचरे का उठान और निस्तारण के पूर्ण इंतजामों की पुष्टि करने व ग्रीन वेस्ट से कंपोस्ट खाद बनाने के मिशन को सुनिश्चित करने के निर्देश दिए थे।

शहर से प्रतिदिन 35 से 40 टन कूड़ा निकलता है। जिसमें लगभग 15 से 20 टन केवल ग्रीन वेस्ट ही है। इसमें से केवल 5 टन गीला कचरा ही उपयोग में लाया जा रहा है। बाकी कूड़ा सूखे कचरे के साथ मिलकर प्रदूषण का बड़ा कारक बन रहा है।

Environmental Pollution Control Authority (EPCA) chairman Bhure Lal said that during his visit to Bhiwadi in Rajasthan on October 19, 2019, he found that officials had taken inadequate measures to curb burning of garbage. "A massive fire was observed at the dump yard in the RIICO industrial area. Locals complained that garbage is set on fire on a daily basis," he said.

Along the Sohna road, near Bhiwadi Management Association, heaps of plastic, synthetic waste and foam generated by industrial units were lying in the open and several sites were filled with ashes.

The EPCA said several fires have been started in the industrial areas of Khushkhera, Bhiwadi and Alwar and apprehended that with the onset of winter, more and more heaps of these industrial waste were likely to be burnt.

An online survey web page updated in Feb, 2020, had this to say about perceptions about Bhiwadi :

However, in one residential society - Utsav in Ashiana Village, composting of wet kitchen wastes from three blocks has continued without disruption, for 4.5 months in colony level drums. 

Additionally, some twenty households in this society continue to process their own kitchen wet wastes in small home composting units. 

The Criticality of Composting

In 2011, the 27 states in the European Union composted on average 15 percent of municipal waste, with Austria composting 34 percent, the Netherlands 28 percent, and countries like France, Spain, and Germany each composting about 18 percent.

A 2019 article said that India produces 1.5 lakh tonnes of solid waste every day and its biodegradable fraction can be upto 70 per cent for various Indian cities. Not even 5 per cent of organic waste generated by cities is converted into compost in India, even though the Swachh Bharat Mission has committed to ensuring that all organic waste produced in Indian cities is processed into making compost.

Landfilling, although according to the waste hierarchy the worst option, is still the most used MSW disposal method in the EU. Landfills need to be constructed and operated in line with the EU Landfill Directive (impermeable barriers, methane capturing equipment) to avoid environmental damage from the generation of methane and effluent.

Bio-waste is a putrescible, generally wet waste. There are two major streams – green waste from parks, gardens etc. and kitchen waste. The former includes usually 50-60% water and more wood, the latter contains no wood but up to 80% water.
As the efficiency of incineration is lowered by the moist bio-waste, it can be beneficial to remove bio-waste from municipal waste.

Waste to Energy (WtE) plants need waste of high calorific value and low moisture content to generate electricity. Only non-biodegradable, non-recyclable waste should be sent to these plants, as per the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016. This would include only non-recyclable plastics, polymers etc.

But in India, it’s mixed waste that’s sent to WtE plants. And this mixed waste (not considering inerts) has high vegetable and wet waste content – close to 60-70 percent. Whereas non-biodegradable non-recyclable waste comes to less than 10 percent of the mixed waste.

Moreover, as the waste is mostly unsegregated with high wet content, it’s unsuitable for burning. To burn, extra fuel is needed, which would make power generation itself inefficient.

Middle-class residents in big cities generate nearly 0.8 kg of waste per day. And nearly 60% or more of the daily waste generated in households is made up of organic matter.

With increasing food demand and depleting soil quality, city compost plays a very important role as a replacement or supplement to chemical fertilisers in replenishing the nutrient-depleted soil.

Why 2 min / 24 hrs / 10 days electric composting machines being sold in India are a SCAM !

Laughably, Excel Industries sells a composter claiming to compost in 2 MINUTES ! (apart from Excel machines claiming to compost in 24 hours / 10 days). 

There are many other companies in India making similar claims - for example Alfa-Therm sells machines claiming to compost in 24 hours / 10 days. 

All of these machines are SCAMS, claiming to compost in 2 minutes / 24 hours / 10 days. Here is why i say this : 

1. No scientific study in the world claims to complete composting of organics in less than 2 weeks. 

2. Even where machines have been used for composting in a few cases in the west, the wet waste undergoes processing INSIDE the machine from 10 - 14 days ATLEAST. After that it undergoes further curing outside for some weeks. 

Please note that such a length of time to compost is far more than the manual aerobic process employed in revolving drum composting, where composting AND curing are completed in 20 days after the bin is full. 

3. ALL studies say that no shredding is required for kitchen wet wastes so one of the claimed functions of these machines is useless for this purpose. Studies ALSO say that no enhancers are needed for kitchen wastes which are teeming with microbial life. So this so-called function of these machines is also not of any use. 

4. Some of these machines provide artificial heating for composting which is a ridiculous proposition - when massed together, wet wastes with free flow of oxygen around them, teem with microbial life NATURALLY. 

In manual composting, the compost pile heats up within the first 4-5 days from the activity of numerous organisms breaking down organic matter - temperatures are typically over 50 degrees C when manual composting is done right.

5. Finally, the machines claim to mix all the wet wastes together - but they do it only during the duration of the wet waste in the machine which is only 2 min / 20 min / 24 hours. 

Mixing - which forces oxygen through the wet wastes, increasing microbial activity, is required throughout the composting operation. Only the revolving drum process achieves that, not ANY of these machines. 

6. The machines are NOT labour saving at all - the 10 day composting machine demands labour add only 55 kgs to it at a time, wait for 20 minutes, then cart the effluent from the machine in several baskets to a curing rack. This is not needed in a manual aerobic revolving drum process - once you put the wet wastes in, they only come out fully usable. 

One wonders what half-baked 'compost' will result at the end of 10 days as there is no daily mixing of wastes unlike in revolving drum system (the baskets in the machine system stay stationary). 

7. Further, in the 10 day machine system, the stationary baskets are automatically sprayed with water every 90 min, or so the company literature says. That is an astonishing step to take : wet kitchen wastes require NO water addition, studies say. 

In fact all this extra water addition will create anaerobic conditions which will :

A. Halt aerobic composting. 
B. Give rise to methane gas which is the same as PNG supplied in pipes for cooking across Delhi and surrounding towns. Methane is highly inflammable - which is why dumpsites across india where wet wastes are dumped, are always on fire. 
C. Produce ammonia, which is a highly irritating gas with a pungent, suffocating odor.
D. Produce some half-done wet mass in the end which cannot compare with aerobically produced compost which does enormous good to soils.

Aerobic manual composting done right produces no smell, no nuisance, and quickly converts wet wastes into compost. No power is needed and very simple equipment made from recycled wastes suffices.

In contrast, these machines, especially the 24 hour composting ones, use humongous amounts of power, which flies against the need to bring down electricity use - to save India from heating up due to coal burning.

The machines can also end up burning plastic wastes alongside wet wastes during heating, releasing noxious cancerous fumes. But even the machine variants that claim to not heat the wet wastes, do not follow scientific composting guidelines. 

Aerobic composting is important for saving the earth from heating up as well - a set of recent studies showed that compared to the current dumping of wet wastes (shown in blue), aerobic composting will result in a massive amount of less carbon in the air (shown in green) over 20 years.

That is because the present dumping of wet wastes  is generating a high proportion of methane, 30 times as effective at warming earth as CO2. The wet waste dumping is also generating a huge amount of nitrous oxide gas, which is 300 TIMES as effective as CO2 at warming the planet. 


In fact, if all the presently dumped organic wet wastes were AEROBICALLY composted, that would result in the sequestering (capture from air) of a huge amount of CO2 as well.

While the study pertained to California, it surely has implications for the rest of the world. 

Compost in 24 hours ? Really ?

The Ministry of Chemicals and Fertilizers notified the Policy on Promotion of City Compost in 2016 which makes it mandatory for all big offices, schools, hotels, housing complexes and municipal corporations in India to convert their wet waste into compost. Post this, companies promising 'compost in 24 hours' from organic waste, have been mushrooming all over the country. 

Such a technology does not find mention in the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016 or in the Advisory on On-Site and Decentralized Composting of Municipal Organic Waste, issued by the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs in 2018. But companies selling such technology are still mushrooming. 

Bangalore

Is it a technical glitch or a fraud in broad daylight? wondered the residents of Salarpuria Symphony apartments in Bengaluru as a swanky machine gathered dust in the corner in 2019. The residents’ association had purchased the machine in 2017.

The seller had assured residents that the machine would churn out instant compost. But, says Sudhakar Shanmukham, a resident, “But all that the Rs 9 lakh machine produces is ash.”

While selling the machine, the company had also promised to buy back the output at Rs 1 per kg. But it stopped procuring after the initial purchase of 2,000 kilogrammes without giving any explanation.

In fact, the company officials did not respond to calls when the machine broke down and started billowing smoke, Shanmukham says.

Another society in Bangalore has a machine in working condition, but what it produces is not compost. “It is a kind of charred material. We have tried offering it to our landscape gardeners and farmers in nearby areas. But they say it’s of little use to them.” Small wonder, this company too too has stopped procuring the compost. They too, had an informal agreement with the residents’ association to buy back the compost at Re 1 per kg.

With mounds of “compost” piling up in the basement, the association plans to sell the machine at scrap price and install a traditional composting unit. D Randeep, commissioner of solid waste management at the Bangalore Municipal Corporation, says they are against instant composters. These generate ash instead of good quality compost, he says.

Here is a typical story of a 24-hour composting machine : At an apartment complex in Electronics City in Bangalore, the management had installed an automatic compost machine in 2016 at a cost of ₹10 lakh. Initially it worked well and the company even bought the ‘compost’ generated as promised. But soon, things started to change.

According to Sudhakar S., a resident of the apartment complex, smoke billowed out from the machine, which also began to consume a lot of electricity. The exhaust had to be finally turned towards a vacant plot adjacent to the building to avoid the smoke.

“The electricity bill went up to ₹30,000 a month. The compost generation was also not efficient. When we reached out to the company, they began dodging our calls and later blocked our numbers,” he said. Today, the machine is gathering dust.

In another instance in Padmanabhanagar in Bangalore, residents procured a compost-making machine. which assured ‘pre-compost’ by drying the wet waste fed into it. Within days, the machine broke down, said B.R. Moudgal (name changed on request), a resident of the apartment.

“Some of the key elements broke down and the machine kept burning stuff in it. Luckily, we had taken it only on a trial basis and we gave it back,” the resident added.

Gurgaon

In 2018, the Municipal Corporation of Gurugram (Gurgaon) (MCG) was trying to identify suitable composting technologies for housing complexes in the city. It was approached by several vendors dealing with instant composters. Before validating the technology, MCG wanted them to run pilot projects in various localities. However, their output was charred, clumpy and had a burnt or foul smell. Based on this, then MCG commissioner Yashpal Yadav refused to approve the empanelment of instant composters in the city. 

Pune

In 2014, Pune municipal corporation incurred an expense of Rs 15 crore to install 13 wet garbage composting plants, with a running cost of electricity bills worth Rs 1 lakh for a 3-tonne machine and Rs 2 lakh for a 5-tonne one. 

Organic waste can be shrunk up to 90% in a day by these composting machines but the 'compost' takes 30 days to mature. When these plants were conceived, there was no plan to store this compost for maturing. With no option, the municipal corporation now dumps the output of the machine in the vicinity of its plants, but is facing opposition from locals. 

The Pune municipal corporation admitted in an affidavit to the National Green Tribunal (NGT)  in 2017 that conversion of organic waste into compost in 24 hours is practically impossible, as it takes at least 30 days for the compost to be ready.

Pune based, Nagari Chetana Manch asked the NGT to shut down the solid waste processing plants in Pune, as the so called 24-hour micro organism-based compost is scientifically impossible. Tests had found that the so-called compost from these machines was hazardous to plants as well as human beings. 

Dr S A Ismail, soil biologist and ecologist said, “Composting is a natural biological process where the organic material undergoes gradual decomposition, and in a natural system takes a minimum of 30 days.”

Ismail added that the 24-hour machines do not produce compost. They only produce an end product of pulverised material. “It may be harmful to the soil if used as compost. This 24-hour process can at best reduce the volume so that it can be used for land-filling.” 

The Final Word ?

However, Abhishek Gupta, managing director of Reddo natura, defends the technology. “Our machines accelerate the process of composting which takes five to six months."

He is wrong ofcourse. Aerobic composting takes just 30 days except in winter, when it may take uptill 45 days.

In 2018, a citizens’ group, Solid Waste Management Round Table (SWMRT), analysed instant compost. “We compared the samples with compost prepared using traditional methods, such as vermicompost,” says Savita Hiremath.

Unlike traditional compost varieties, which are repositories of microbes, instant compost had zero microbial content, poor carbon-nitrogen ratio and was highly acidic. Acidic compost hinders absorption of nutrients by plants. 

“The vendors say the machines are organic waste converters. But in reality, they are just incinerators." 

What the 24 hour 'composting machines' do is an entirely different process from composting. These machines simply remove water and other volatile components out of the organic material thrown into it for composting.

“Many a times the waste that goes inside there is not entirely organic waste. Sometimes plastic waste get into it and thus, when the processing starts inside the machine, it releases toxic fumes which are very harmful for health,” Savita Hiremath clarifies. These toxic fumes that contains carcinogens like dioxins and furans get into the air we breathe. “What comes out of these machines is not compost, but burnt carbon.”

According to SWMRT, the automated composting machines are causing pollution at all levels. The burning of mixed waste, high power consumption, emission of toxic smoke and dumping of the same into the soil is triggering groundwater pollution. All of these are hazardous to the environment. Its report also suggests sustainable decomposing methods that are safe and natural as they rely only on microorganisms.

SWMRT has submitted a letter to the KSPCB, urging the body to issue an advisory stating that the machines are not composters but incinerators, thereby laying an embargo on the buying and selling of the machines. The letter also requests an official inquiry and a ban on these machines.

“The concept is very close to burning garbage,” a scientist pointed out. The best approach, experts and government officials say, is to compost the organic way, which takes about 30 days.

These are machines that were rejected in countries like Canada but are allowed to be used in our country. 

Making compost in 50 days from Day 1 of putting wet waste in the compost bin !

Khad (compost) from our compost box has been working well since about March 2018. No food waste is now given out to trash. Our earlier knowledgeable farmer housekeeper said it was as good as gobar ki khad (cow dung manure).

We are sold the composting bin by a local industrialist as part of his philanthropic work, for about 250-300 rs. a set, as I recall : 1. a re-used industrial bin which has been perforated on all the sides including top and bottom. 2. a bag of coco-peat which comes from the coconut tree. 3. a panja to turn the waste with.

Close up of the perforations in the compost bin..

Here's our kitchen waste, ready to be put into the composting bin. we leave out only narial ka khol (coconut shell), aam ki gitak (mango seed) etc. as they would take too long to compost. Those are bagged and put out to the waste collector when bag is full. but they are not mixed with dry waste such as paper, plastic, rubber which is easily sale-able and collected in a big bag until brimming full, then tied a knot on and put out. We dont use plastic bags as lining for kitchen waste. cut newspapers do the job perfectly well.

When starting out a new bin, one puts two fist-fulls of the coco-peat at bottom.

One empties the wet waste bin in the composting bin. one then washes and leaves the wet waste bin to dry. the second wet waste bin, already washed and put to dry the previous day, is put in the kitchen.

One then adds a fistful of coco-peat to the wet waste.

One mixes the coco-peat into the wet waste using the panja provided. one closes the bin cover. at our place, the bin is full in about 20 days. the wet waste in the  is then given a good mix up with the panja and left to the side somewhere where too much rain cant get into it. In about a month, it looks mature and black the way you saw in the first image.

we then normally put the compost in our plant pots and kyaris where it composts further. you can turn the soil a bit to hide it if you like.  We dont need to dry the compost as you saw in the first picture. we were drying it this time only to use it like the coco-peat bag - so one need not source coco peat again and again. one can just use the dried compost as a base layer and then to add a fist full everytime you put wet waste in the composting bin.

so at our rate of generation of wet wastes (two of us + 1-2 staff + guests over perhaps once a week), we need three compost bins which we have. but a family with less number of people to cater to, would still need two compost bins if they dont want to throw any wet wastes out, which we dont.