Garbage in Hyderabad sold out - Deccan Chronicle

June 1: As cities grow and create more garbage, disposal of the waste has become a big problem for municipal corporations around the country, including the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation. So the trend to generate power from garbage, thus keeping cities clean, saving municipal bodies money, and increasing power capacity in a power-hungry city, can only be welcomed.

The waste to electricity project will mean a saving of nearly Rs 200 crore per annum for the GHMC, the amount it spends on collection, transportation, dumping and disposal of 3,500 metric tonnes of garbage generated every day in the city, which will now be done by private operators. The privately owned waste-to-energy plants will make money by converting the municipal solid waste into useful energy (electricity). GHMC has signed an agreement to supply 700 metric tonnes of garbage to Selco power plant at Shadnagar, another 700 metric tonnes per day to RDF Power Plant at Bibinagar, 700 metric tonnes to Sri Venkateshwara Green Power Project Ltd. at Ibrahimpatnam and the remaining to Ramky Enviro Engineers Ltd. at Jawaharnagar. What’s more, the Tata Power Trading Company, a giant in the private power sector, has come forward to purchase the power generated by RDF and Sri Venkateshwara power plants. Selco already has an agreement with APTransco, and Ramky is all set to finalise its power purchase agreement with a private company. Urban development experts and environmentalists have welcomed the waste to energy route for garbage disposal. As private companies stand to make crores of rupees, they will ensure that no garbage is left on the streets, and that it is collected and supplied to them for production of power every day.

Eminent environmentalist Mr K. Purushotham Reddy said: “The sate government should set up a mechanism to monitor that the remains of the garbage, after energy is produced, is disposed off in a scientific manner. Let’s hope the private garbage power plants project is successful and Greater Hyderabad becomes a more eco-friendly city.” Venkateshwara Projects will take 700 metric tonnes of garbage daily from GHMC and produce nearly 2 lakh power units per day, according to its executive director Mr N.S.R. Naidu. The 12 MW garbage power plant of Venkateshwara will be operational soon.

The 11 MW waste-to-energy plant of RDF Power Projects Pvt. Ltd. at Bibinagar has already signed a power purchase agreement with Tata Power, which will buy power at Rs 3.60 per unit. The plant will produce 2 lakh units of power every day. The SELCO power plant at Shadnagar and Sriram Energy Systems Pvt. Ltd. at Vijayawada, were the first in the country to start producing power out of garbage. They have a long-term agreement with APTransco to purchase power from them.

In fact, all metropolitan cities are now promoting garbage power plants as not only a solution to dispose of garbage in an environmentally sound way but also to turn a profit while doing so.

Ramky Enviro Engineers Ltd.’s project director, Ms Padmaja, said that the company’s Rs 897 crore integrated solid waste management project in Greater Hyderabad will not only set up the garbage power plant but also establish a sorting plant, compost units and leachate sumps at the Jawaharnagar dumping yard.

These three main components of the project will gradually put an end to air and ground water pollution besides allowing the segregation of garbage at the dumping yard if not at the doorsteps of citizens. Leachate sumps will suck the liquid from the garbage while the sorting plant will segregate materials that are harmful to the environment and those that can be sent for recycling or to compost units. The GHMC additional commissioner, health and sanitation, Mr S.K. Aleem Basha, said the demand for supply of garbage to the private power plants is increasing. “All the agreements are in place for supply of 3,500 metric tonnes of garbage to the power plants. One power plant has recently urged us to increase their quota from 700 metric tonnes to 1,000 metric tonnes of garbage per day,” he said.

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Plant to accept more leachate - Waste Management World

BUCHANAN - The wastewater treatment plant in Buchanan will accept up to three times the amount of leachate that it now takes in from the Southeast Berrien County Landfill.

It's a move that will save the landfill $250,000 per year and generate about $50,000 annually for the city, Buchanan City Manager William Marx said.

Leachate is water after it drains through the landfilled trash and collects at the bottom of the dump. It contains a variety of chemicals and other matter from contact with the refuse.

"This is quite a savings for the landfill. We have the ability to take this," said Buchanan Mayor Carla Cole, who's also a member of the Southeast Berrien County Landfill Authority board.

Under an agreement drafted in 1984, Marx said the city's wastewater treatment plant has taken up to 25,000 gallons of leachate per day from the landfill.

Additional leachate from the landfill has been shipped by tanker to a treatment plant in Elkhart at a much higher cost because of transportation costs.

Marx said he recently had lunch with landfill general manager Sonny Fuller and listened to his desire to reduce the expense of shipping leachate.

Marx said he began checking with operators at the wastewater plant and learned as much as 100,000 gallons of leachate per day can easily be safely treated at the plant.

The Buchanan City Commissioners unanimously voted in favor of an agreement this week that allows the landfill to transport additional leachate to the plant through an existing pipeline.

Marx said the move has been approved by the Michigan Department of Natural Resources.

He said the landfill will have to perform some upgrades to its lift station to increase the flows.

Commissioner Dave Hagey applauded what he said he felt was a sample of the creative solutions ordinary citizens don't realize are occurring in local government.

"These are the kind of things percolating below the surface that people don't understand," Hagey said.

Cole said transporting leachate by tanker costs the landfill $115 per hour.

"This is where our biggest savings is going to be," the mayor said.

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Unlocking energy from our fetid garbage tombs - CTV.ca

ANH CHU - The Globe and Mail

In Calgary's Shepard landfill, the seagulls squawk like a dissenting mob amid the drone of heavy machinery flattening trash. But one hectare of land sits with no apparent activity above ground. Below the surface lies the potential to transform the way cities manage their solid waste.

This site is home to the Biocell, a pilot project whose premise – garbage as a renewable resource – sounds more like wishful thinking than reality.

“Landfills are garbage graveyards, or perpetual storage,” says Patrick Hettiaratchi, biocell research lead at the University of Calgary's Schulich School of Engineering. Unexpected finds have been unearthed from old landfills, where even organic waste such as yard clippings and kitchen scraps are slow to biodegrade in the dry, tomb-like conditions.

“It's quite easy to read a newspaper from the 1970s,” says Corey Colbran, landfill operations leader at the City of Calgary.

Conventional sanitary landfills try to minimize the two common hazards of trash: leachate (toxic garbage juice) and methane (a major contributor to greenhouse gases). The biocell is a sustainable, closed-loop system in which the negative byproducts of garbage become advantages.

Leachate is collected at the bottom of the cell and recirculated through a network of pipes – meaning the toxic soup doesn't need to burden wastewater treatment plants. The moisture from the leachate speeds up the degradation of the garbage, and because no oxygen is present, the anaerobic environment accelerates the production of methane. The research team at the Schulich School of Engineering is finding ways to augment the leachate to degrade tough materials.

Normally, more methane is not a desirable outcome. But within the biocell, the gas is collected and converted into electricity. From 2007 to 2009, more than 800,000 cubic metres were converted into electricity, which then helped power Calgary’s light-rail transit system.

The production of methane for electricity is not new, but the landfill biocell is unique. A two-day workshop of international engineering consultants provided the genesis for the pilot project in 2003. “People have tried gas extraction before. People have tried landfill mining. We said, ‘Why don't we combine these ideas?’” explains Dr. Hettiaratchi.

Methane production is the first of three stages. “The first stage is an anaerobic reactor, where we get the gas out. For the second stage, we put air into the system and make it aerobic, so it becomes like composting,” says Dr. Hettiaratchi. About 70 per cent of the waste in Calgary's landfills is organic.

Once methane production slows, phase two begins and air is dispersed throughout the cell to mimic the aerobic biodegradation that occurs during composting. The resulting compost-like material should be stable enough to use in the city's parks.

In the third and last phase, the area will be mined for non-biodegradable materials. “Dirty plastics could be used to manufacture things like park benches,” Dr. Hettiaratchi explains.

Calgary has about 30 to 40 years of landfill space left, and a biocell could extend that to 100 years. It would also be cost-effective. “The landfill becomes a cheap processing facility,” says Dr. Hettiaratchi. Researchers picture biocells processing landfill waste in networks of 10 cells – with eight in operation concurrently, one in the filling stage and one in the excavating stage.

The project is as collaborative as the techniques suggest. In addition to the university, the City of Calgary works with consulting engineering firm Stantec for design and construction, and CH2M Hill for operations.

The pilot has yet to be completed and its results analyzed, but the bottom line is the biocell must prove itself as a financially viable option for cities.

“The focus is on making sure all the technology works” before applying for patents for particular components, says Dr. Hettiaratchi, noting that any experiment may have unexpected results.

“Our initial research estimate, as far as construction was concerned, was that the biocell would cost 50 per cent more than the typical landfill,” he says, estimating that Calgary has spent about $2-million to $3-million so far in the biocell's construction, not including operations and management.

“Regardless of what methods a municipality chooses to manage its organic waste, there will still be landfills of some description, because some materials are just not recyclable or reusable,” says Stantec's Don Davies.

The biocell can generate energy, create compost, recover other resources and reduce the amount of leachate and greenhouse gas emissions produced, but the biggest advantage could come in a finite resource that all burgeoning cities face: space.

“Space is at a premium at landfill sites, so excavating the site is critical because you're then able to reuse that area,” says Mr. Colbran.

The biocell project has already garnered awards for innovation in engineering. If the results remain as promising as they have been in Calgary's dry and wintry climes, which prolong the process, the benefits are far-reaching. In fact, a waste management company from Mumbai has already discussed adopting the technology.

Mr. Davies speaks best to the necessity of innovative thinking when it comes to garbage: “Whether it's the biocell concept or some other method of processing organic waste, this is the future.”

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Judge Orders Guam EPA to Inspect Questioned Dump Sites Around Ordot Dump - Pacific News Center

Sunday, 29 May 2011 14:04 Written by Kevin Kerrigan Friday, 27 May 2011 17:54

Guam News - Guam News

Guam - At the request of  Federal receiver GBB, District Court Judge Francis Tydingco-Gatewood has ordered Guam EPA to investigate a number of dump sites within a 3 mile radius of the Ordot Dump.

In a Special Report to the Court filed Thursday, the receiver cites "several dump sites" near the Ordot Dump, and one very large one. The exact number is not stated.

Its not clear whether any of these sites are properly permitted, but the receiver notes that none of them are lined and therefore a source of leachate, "all dump sites produce leachate," states the receiver's report and leachate is "one of the principal causes of pollution from the Ordot Dump and one of the primary reasons for the Consent Decree."

Read Federal Receiver GBB's request for order

In its request for an inspection of these sites, GBB notes that the "identification of all sources of  leachate and other groundwater contamination is an important step" in the final closure of the Ordot dump which is slated to close August 31.

 

And the leachate from these other, unlined dumps, are a "potential problem for accurately understanding and mitigating the pollution coming from the Ordot Dump itself " and "potentially complicates the process for final closure of the Ordot Dump."

Read the District Court's Order

GBB requested, and the Judge agreed in an order issued Friday, to require Guam EPA to investigate all dump sites within a 3 mile radius of the Ordot Dump to determine:

1. The compliance of these dump sites with applicable Guam and federal laws and regulations;
2. The size and approximate leachate potential for each such dump site;
3. The party responsible for the site;
4. The potential of the dump site to complicate the closure of the Ordot Dump; and
5. The steps recommended or taken by GEPA to eliminate these dump sites as a source of contamination of the environment in the vicinity of the Ordot Dump.

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State plans upgrades at closed landfill, By LAUREL BEAGER, Editor - International Falls Daily Journal

County considers transferring ownership of site to state

As the state of Minnesota prepares to spend $5.5 million to improve a closed landfill in International Falls, the question of whether Koochiching County or the state should own the property has been raised.

The landfill located in International Falls is owned by Koochiching County, but is subject to a landfill cleanup agreement with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, which holds an easement to the property and response action equipment on the property, according to Tom Newman, land manager with the Closed Landfill and Superfund programs of the Remediation Division of the MPCA.

Newman met with the county board this week to propose that the county turn total ownership of the property over to the state.

Newman told the board that the MPCA used proceeds from the sale of state general obligation bonds for capital costs of environmental response actions that the MPCA took at the landfill beginning in 2003. As a result, certain requirements on sale or other disposition of the property are imposed. To ensure that requirements of state law and the commissioner’s order are carried out, a declaration must be signed by the state and county and recorded.

Newman explained that the state is responsible for the long-term care of the landfill, but Koochiching County also has liability as the owners of the property.Newman said the transfer of ownership to the state would make his duties easier.

(Video has no connection with the article.)

Meanwhile, Newman said the MPCA is seeking bonding money this session to make improvements at the landfill site. Should the Legislature not grant the money, the MPCA would seek it the next year.

He said the $5.5 million would be used to place an impervious cover over the landfill; upgrade the system that collects water leaching from the landfill, thereby improving drainage; and increase the amount of leachate removed from the site from 6,000 gallons per day to 24,000 gallons per day. Should the leachate amount increase as expected, the state would consider installing a forced main line from thel leachate pond to the North Koochiching Sanitary Sewer District.

Commissioners asked if the county could dovetail on the state’s project should it move forward with installing a line to the sewer treatment plant by connecting nearby residences to sewer at the same time.

Newman said the county project would need to meet the time line of the state.

Commissioners asked questions about liability should the leachate “plume” move off the site toward residences.

Newman said the state accepts no liability, just responsibility.

“My job is to make sure the plume does not move off site,” he said, adding that he would guide development and the county could implement development plans to avoid installing wells nearby.

Should the plume move toward existing residences in a natural way, the state would take action to keep people safe, including installing filtration systems on wells in the area of concern.

However, he said, questions could arise should a high capacity well be installed nearby that draws the plume toward residences and contaminates wells.

A closed landfill in Northome was also discussed, and Newman said the state could provide easements for access to logging areas, but the landfill itself could not be used as a staging area for logs.

“All our concerns are about houses and development — people putting wells in,” he said.

Newman said at some point in the future, all properly closed and handled landfills can be used. However, he said it may take generations before the properties stop producing methane gas and leachate allowing for development.

He said a bill at the Legislature now would allow the state to “delist” all or portions of closed landfills that staff feel are safe for development. Now, he said, the closed landfills can not be used.

Newman was asked to research whether the state would consider a reverter clause that would provide state ownership to the property, but would revert back to county ownership at some point.
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