Clean-up will be a slow and gradual exercise, which will include a process, called the bioremediation of liga was waste, which is mandatory by the central government to clean the dumpses.
Bioramdiation uses micro-organisms or plants so that they can break pollutants from the environment by converting less harmful or non-toxic forms.
Spread over 311 acres, Donor Dumping Ground began in 1927 and is the oldest operations in Mumbai.
Among the total land parcels, the state government has built 124 acres of land for Dharavi redevelopment, while BMC will keep 136 acres of land. Officials said the remaining land is marshy and unusable.
According to BMC Assistant Commissioner Kiran Dighwakar, who are handling the project, the site currently has 2 crore metric tonnes of garbage and it is a huge task by removing it.
“It is one of the largest dumps in the country. Such bioremediation projects are done in the country, but they are on a very small scale. It’s a challenging task,” said Dighwakar.
Currently, Mumbai produces 7,200 tonnes of garbage daily. After the deonar is closed, the Kanjuramarg dumpy, which is operational from 2009-2010, will be the only active dumpite in the metropolis.
Denar dump yard
Deonar Landfil is in the eastern suburbs of Mumbai. In the early 20th century, Govandi, Deonar, Shivajinagar and Makhard areas were open fields with slightly populated lands. However, settlements in the area started growing over time and it passed through rapid urbanization in the 1990s.
According to BMC data, 600 tonnes of solid waste is dumped on the site every day. This has caused air pollution and environmental threats for the residents in the surrounding area.
According to BMC data, the M/E ward reports low life expectancy and high tuberculosis in the vicinity of Dionar.
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project
During a meeting between the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (Mohua) and BMC in November 2023, it was decided to close the dumpie using the Bioremdiation method.
According to BMC Tender, the purview of the project includes a bioremediation of about 20 million tonnes of heritage waste – partially or fully disintegrated biodegradable waste, plastic waste, textiles, metals, glass and a mixture of other components.
It is excavated, separated, processed, used, and disposed. BMC says as a process, it will introduce bio-culture to bioremediations to speed up biological waste decomposition. The output material will be tested intense to ensure environmental compliance. The landfill will have five sets of working machinery simultaneously.
In addition, the project involves the transport of waste-specific fuel (RDF)-fuel produced from upheld materials, mainly for municipal solid waste-cement factories or waste-to-energy plants.
Soil and other excerpts will be settled to fill in site leveling or low-fold areas according to the sanctioned environmental laws.
The project prepares recycling IE metals, plastic to send authorized recycling units.
A BMC official said, “The project will be executed using scientific methods, reducing environmental hazards such as methane emissions, groundwater contamination, air pollution, etc.
According to Dighavkar, this process will separate the waste by using large sieve machines and separating the fine soil and plastic and dried waste. Plastic can be used for comstibles and energy in cement companies.
A total of 2,000 vehicle movements will be seen per day for 25,000 metric tonnes of waste processing per day at Donor Dumping Ground.
Deonar is not the first landfill that will have to pass through a bioremediation. The Mulund dump yard’s bioremediation was started at 2018 when it was ordered to be closed.
However, even after seven years, and despite having a 60 million metric tonnes of waste, only 67 percent of the work is done than the Deonar site, only 67 percent of the work is done, the dawn said.
He said, “It will still be another year ago.” Deonar is a very ambitious project, given that we cannot work during the monsoon months. Therefore, technically we have about 24 months. “
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Dispute and fire
The dump yard is infamous for its recurring fire. Between January 2015 and March 2016, major fire incidents were reported in Deonar. In 2016, the fire proceeded for five days, which closed the BMC schools in the area. In the nearby areas, people were having difficulty in breathing due to smog and high -level particulate pollutants.
After these fire, the Bombay High Court ordered the BMC to close the Mulund and Denar dump yard, given that they have reached their saturation points. At that point, the dump yard received about 3,000 tonnes of garbage daily. But the civic body got a time expansion by December 2019 to shut down it.
Then again in 2018, there was a fire in Deonar, which went for a few days.
BMC says that Civic Body has been trying to find a scientific way to shut down landfill since 2005. A few years ago, BMC stated that it would scientifically construct the waste-to-energy plant in the donor to convert waste into energy.
The plant is considered to process 1,800 tonnes of waste daily and generate 8 MW of electricity.
However, the plant is yet to be constructed and is expected to be ready by October 2025 as per the civic body. But already residents of Govandi are in weapons against the proposed plant, stating that it will emit toxic chemicals, putting their lives in danger.
Advocate Abbas Sayyed, a resident and a worker from the Govandi-Dunar area where the project is expected to come, said that such a project normally falls in the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) area and not in the residential areas with densely populated population.
He said, “The corporation has not taken care of health hazards here. Life expectancy in Jivanid is less and tuberculosis is high here. It is not good for the residents here and now they will also move the Dharavi residents here. It is not good,” he said.
In addition to the concurrent fire on the site, another reason that the dumping ground has become controversial as the state government’s decision to allocate it for the Dharavi redevelopment project in September in September, just before the assembly elections.
Project opposition
After Thursday’s tender notice to clean the dumping ground, the opposition MVA raised strong objections on this. “Helping Seth ji to dump people by dumping people in a landfill, this is actually a garbage SETA government! The shameless Adani government has received the @mybmc to float Rs 2368 crore, which is the tender for the Donar Dumping Ground,” Congress Mumbai North Central MP and City Congress President Varash Gaqav have written on X.
He said that the criteria said that even after closing the dumping sites, human settlements should not be allowed for at least 15 years. “The Maharashtra government does anything to please Seth, what if it needs to be sent to Dharavikar to die in the dumping ground!” Gaikwad said.
Shiv Sena (UBT) MLA Aaditya Thackeray alleged that BMC has imposed “Adani Tax” on Mumbai as a “waste management fee”.
He claimed that BMC has forcibly taken a parcel of land in Mumbai, now connected to the Adani Group, to transfer around 50,000 residents from the Dharavi Slum Cluster under the redevelopment project.
He claimed that the cost of cleaning and managing this land is being given to the residents of Mumbai. “Why should Mumbai be made to pay to clean a parcel of land snatched by Adani Group?” Thackeray said.
These allegations from MVA have been continuing since last year, when before being kicked in the pole of conduct, the state government allotted 1,080 acres of land for Kurla Dairy, Mulund, Salt PAN Lands, The Donor Dumping Ground and Madh Island such as Adani -led Dharvidli Project (DRPPL).
The land parcel partly falls on the donor dumping ground, causing severe criticism.
(Edited by Ajit Tiwari)
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