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Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena on Thursday visited all three landfill sites at Ghazipur, Okhla and Bhalswa and took stock of the progress of the ongoing waste remediation and disposal works.
Notably, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) has in its order dated February 16, 2023, constituted a High-Level Solid Waste Monitoring Committee under the Lt Governor, on the lines of the high-level committee constituted by it for cleaning of the Yamuna. Garbage that was being disposed from the three unseemly landfill sites at an average rate of 1.41 lakh MT per month from 2019 till June 2022, went up to about 6 lakh MT per month by December 2022, thereby, increasing the legacy waste disposal by over 400 per cent. During the seven months between July 2022 and February 2023, about 30 lakh MT of solid aste has been disposed of from the landfill sites, which has resulted in reducing the height of garbage mounds at each of the three sites by at least 15 metres in just seven months, said the Raj Niwas statement. LG Saxena informed that sufficient infrastructure and arrangements with central government agencies and Industry have been now put in place to ensure a disposal rate of about 10 lakh MT per month, and instructed the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) to achieve this target during the next three months. The LG informed that while 45 lakh MT of legacy Inert and construction and demolition waste had been committed to be consumed by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and Delhi Development Authority (DDA) at their construction sites, public participation had ensured the lifting of about 1 lakh MT Inert and construction and demolition waste, during the last six months. Similarly, the Waste-to-Energy Power Plants, which were opened and upgraded during the last six months were consuming 6,000 MTs of Refuse-derived fuel (RDF) waste every day. An innovative step of involving the Corporate Sector to utilize the legacy RDF waste at the landfill sites, had resulted in the Cement Industry picking up about 15,000 to 20,000 MT of RDF waste every month for use as fuel. This has resulted in about 1 lakh MT of RDF being disposed sustainably during the last seven months. As of now, five cement companies, situated till as far as Chittorgarh in Rajasthan, are picking up RDF from Delhi's landfill sites. In another development, paper mills situated in Western UP districts like Shamli, Muzaffarnagar, Itawa, etc have also started lifting nearly 100 MT RDF waste per day from Delhi, said the statement. The LG said that nearly 400 acres of low-lying land belonging to the Land and Development Office, at Badarpur is also planned to be filled using Inert and construction and demolition waste from the Okhla landfill site. The LG Secretariat is coordinating with the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) to facilitate the same. At present, 50 Trommeling Machines with enhanced capacity are segregating waste at the three landfill sites in Delhi, up from June 25, 2022, which is the highest in the country, anywhere. For the purpose of Real-Time Monitoring of the bio-remediation of waste and its disposal, Control and Command Centres have been set up at the landfill sites and transportation trucks have been fitted with GPS mechanisms. The Raj Niwas statement said the LG expressed satisfaction over the pace of work at the Okhla and Bhalswa landfill sites, which are set to achieve the capacity of disposing 15,000 MT of waste per day (4.5 lakh MT per month) at each of the two sites. However, he expressed his displeasure over the slow pace of work at the Ghazipur landfill site and directed MCD officials to issue a 7-day termination notice to the contractor to expedite the work failing which heavy penalty would be imposed and criminal proceedings against the contractor will be initiated for wasting government funds and time. (ANI)
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