Was Karnataka cement plant really shut for maintenance?

ANDREA FERNANDES

andrea@herald-goa.com

SALIGAO: Goa Foundation director Dean D’ Cruz had earlier brought to the notice of Herald that for around four months since February 2018 no Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) waste had been sent out from the Solid Waste Management Plant at Saligao to the cement plant at Karnataka. 

Herald is in possession of two delivery challans dated April and June 2018 issued by the ACC Cement plant at Wadi, Gulbarga of RDF being accepted by them.

The Director of Hindustan Waste Treatment Private Limited (HWTPL) Ganesh Kandaswamy said the ACC Cement plant at Wadi, Gulbarga was shut down for maintenance. 

“There was a back log of RDF because there was a maintenance issue at the ACC cement plant at Wadi. We had an agreement with this plant since it was barely 600 kms from our plant. Their plant was shut down for a couple of months and they were not accepting waste from anyone else either,” he informed.

 “RDF is a bi-product generated from a solid waste management plant, which we are sending to cement plants because it is an environment friendly and safe disposal method and defined by Solid Waste Management (SWM) rules 2016. In June, we got into an agreement with JK Cements and in July we sent them nearly 2000 tonnes of RDF,” he added.

Clinton Vaz, a mechanical engineer from Goa who started vRecycle, a small firm based in South Goa that provides waste management solutions informed that the ACC plant was not shut down for maintenance between January and June 2018.

“This plant is totally dependent on co-processing for its survival and if this stops, or Karnataka stops cross border transport of waste, this plant will choke up and stop functioning in a matter of months,” he said.

Mixed waste plant: This treatment plant was designed to handle mixed waste but looking at the plant’s inefficiency, the authorities are now blaming the people for not segregating their waste. The government wants to build three more plants and has approved the setup of a second plant, which is an exact copy of the existing one.

Ex-CCP councillor Patricia Pinto pointed out that this mixed waste plant is considered to be the first-of-its-kind in Asia, with best waste treatment practices incorporated from places such as Germany, Italy, Netherlands and the USA.

“People who were connected with garbage issues knew that this plant will not work. We cannot get recyclables out of mixed waste as it is filthy. After this plant was built, people segregating garbage, stopped, as the government claimed that people could mix the garbage altogether. Now, they are blaming the people for not segregating. According to me, segregation is the only answer,” she told.

Clinton questions the need for a second mixed waste treatment plant. The government should learn from the mistakes and set up a better plant rather than a similar plant. “Panchayats like Moira, Corlim and Assagao, which used to segregate and treat waste at source, have stopped since the plant started. Panjim has stopped composting in the city despite having infrastructure and sends it to Saligao now. The state is heading in reverse gear,” Clinton added.

“The waste accepted here is almost all mixed and how can this plant be efficient with mixed waste. It has been two years and there has been absolutely no effort to get segregated waste. The government is breaking its own SWM Rules of 2016,” he claimed.

GWMC MD, Sanjit Rodrigues said, “Cement plants run on coal and they can only take a percentage of RDF to be mixed. We have completed two years on May 31 and almost 70,000 tonnes of waste has been treated with less than 3 percent going into the landfill. 

Where was this waste going? The people who are questioning this plant should answer.

“There are 27 panchayats which bring their waste here. Most villages segregate between 60% and 80 %. Big panchayats such as Calangute do not segregate. The waste, which comes here, is treated and the RDF that is generated is sent to cement plants through the plant operator,” Sanjit added.