Even as the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) grapples with solid waste management in the city, a few residents said they had a few independent eco-friendly waste-disposal models up their sleev
Even as the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) grapples with solid waste management in the city, a few residents said they had a few independent eco-friendly waste-disposal models up their sleeve.
A start-up called ‘Sampurna(e)arth’ is working with over 100 clients across cities, including corporate giants, housing societies and government organisations, to help them deal with the waste generated daily. The organisation, which was started by three graduates of the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Debartha Banerjee, Jayanth Nataraju, and Ritvik Rao functions through a tie-up with citizens, government bodies, and rag pickers.
It processes wet waste, and segregates dry waste at the source of its generation. Sampurna(e)arth runs three dry waste collection centres in the city, where it collects waste from its clients.
Co-founder Debartha Banerjee said, “Currently, we have tied up with the NGO Stree Mukti Sanghatna, which works for ragpickers, and our clients include corporates such as Axis Bank, DBS bank, and even the Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation for whom we are cleaning up the Govandi station.”
The city generates about 10,500 metric tonnes of waste a day. The BMC’s existing apparatus, which involves six biodigesters at Kanjurmarg, is able to process only 3,000 metric tonnes of waste per day. This waste is capable of producing about 380 cubic metres of gas daily. However, there is much untapped potential in the daily waste generated within the city, which is dumped at the dumping grounds in Deonar and Mulund, without processing or segregation.
Currently, the BMC has 32 dry waste segregation sites in the city and it plans to add another 35 sites to this number. Meanwhile, the civic body is also in the process of setting up waste processing centres in all the 24 ward offices in the city, for recycling kitchen waste produced in the ward offices itself.
The BMC is also in the process of setting up three waste disposal plants in the city, at the proposed sites: the bulldozer garage near the Deonar dumping ground in Govandi, an area near the Gorai dumping ground and premises of the Ajit Glass factory in Andheri.
