These wastes are not suitable for burning in the power plants.in efficient manner. To burn them , additional fuel is required which makes these plants expensive to run.
by N.S.Venkataraman
Perungudi municipal waste dump yard in Chennai has been in the news for all wrong reasons these days. It is often termed as toxic hotspot and several litigations have been filed in the court demanding closure of this dump yard, as it causes serious public health issues.
During the last few days, a massive fire happened at the landfill , burning out the huge deposit of waste dump filled with rubber , plastic, glass and organic waste . The fire produced noxious and poisonous smoke, ash and particulate matter resulting in severe public health problems , affecting thousands of people living in the surrounding areas.
Even before the recent fire incident , due to the vast quantity of mixed waste in dumping yard,, there has been bad stench / odour , mosquito menace, methane gas emission and visual pollution from the dumped waste , which have made the Perungudi dumping yard one of the most polluted areas , probably in the whole country.
Perungudi dump yard in Chennai is spread over 200 acres of land , where around 2500 tonne per day of municipal waste is dumped. It is estimated that the accumulated dumped quantity of waste over the recent years could be around 6 million cubic metre and even more.
Tamil Nadu government’s proposal :
In the Tamil Nadu state assembly, the minister for municipal administration said on 29.4.2022 that the fire in Perungudi dump yard would be doused shortly . To prevent such incidents in future, he said that three years from now, the Tamil Nadu government would set up power plants to generate electricity using non degradable waste from the dump yard in corporations and municipalities.
Meanwhile , news has appeared that on 28th April, 2022, a mobile incinerator plant was inaugurated in Chennai by the Greater Chennai Corporation at a cost of Rs.2.1 crore to incinerate the municipal waste.
Both the above strategies of Tamil Nadu government to handle the municipal waste appear to be questionable , counter productive and environmentally harmful. Such steps ignore the past experience in India in setting up incineration plants and power plants by burning municipal waste.
Harmful effects of incineration plants :
The 2016 World Energy Council report confirmed that harmful emissions are associated with incineration facilities and such emissions consist of harmful content such as metals (mercury, lead and cadmium ) , organics (dioxins and furans ), acid gases ( sulphur dioxide and hydrogen chloride) particulates (dust and grit) , nitrogen oxide and carbon monoxide.
The Tamil Nadu government’s inauguration of the incineration plant comes at a time when the developed countries have stopped setting up incineration plants due to environmental issues.
Setting up incinerator to burn municipal waste is not a desirable option from the public health point of view.
Harmful effects of power plant from municipal waste :
Waste to energy (power plant) , which convert non-biodegradable waste to generate electricity have faced widespread criticism.
Around 92 plants with aggregate capacity of around 250 MW have been set up in the country for producing electricity from waste material such as municipal waste. Most of them now remain closed.
The Okhla waste to energy plant in Delhi has faced continuous protests for polluting the environment. In 2016, the National Green Tribunal had slapped an environmental compensation fine of Rs..25 lakhs .on the plant.
The recent case is of a 5 MW plant in Bengaluru being opposed by the activists on the ground of health and sustainability risks. In Bengaluru, activists are flagging health risks arising from the huge amount of bottom ash being generated by these plants.
The municipal solid waste in India has more organic component , low calorific value and high moisture content, which has direct influence on efficiency of electricity generation. As most wastes sent are unsegregated , they also have high inert content. In a written reply in Parliament, the Power and Energy Minister has also confirmed this.
These wastes are not suitable for burning in the power plants.in efficient manner. To burn them , additional fuel is required which makes these plants expensive to run. This has been the main reason why plants in Kanpur, Bengaluru, Hyderabad , Lucknow, Vijayawada, Karimnagar etc. had to be closed down.
Methanol from municipal solid waste – Appropriate option :
Methanol has widespread applications in various industries. Indian import of methanol is more than two million tonne per annum. India is unable to increase the capacity / production of methanol, since the feedstock namely natural gas is not available in India adequately at globally competitive price and the cost of production of methanol produced from imported natural gas in India is not competitive with that of the methanol produced from natural gas abroad in countries like Iran.
Under the circumstances, production of methanol from municipal waste is an ideal proposition. Methanol production from municipal waste is technically possible and provides the twin advantages of profitably handling municipal waste in eco -friendly manner and producing much needed methanol.
In this process, municipal waste is not subjected to burning or incineration. Waste materials are gasified to produce syngas, which is then catalytically converted to methanol. .
A plant operates in Canada by the company known as Enerkem , which converts municipal solid waste into methanol. The plant has capacity to produce 38 million litres of methanol per annum. Enerkem has validated its technology over several years using municipal solid waste from several municipalities, as well as a broad range of residues. A similar new project is being planned in Netherlands.
Recommendation:
It is absolutely important that the waste material already dumped and to be dumped in the Perungudi dump yard should be handled in a profitable way without causing environmental issues.
The best way of achieving this would be to avoid incineration of municipal waste or setting up power plants using municipal waste but use the municipal waste to produce the much needed value added product methanol.
Well proven technology is available abroad and this project proposal should be favourably viewed.
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