Projects Worth Rs 776 CR To Remediate Legacy Waste In Delhi Approved: MoHUA

Towards achieving the objective of remediation of legacy landfill sites in a time-bound manner, the Centre has approved projects worth Rs 776 crore to remediate 253 lakh metric tonnes of waste spanning 186 acres of land across Delhi, officials said on Monday. A high-level meeting was held on Monday by the Union Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) to discuss the progress made in the remediation of the three legacy dumpsites in areas -- Okhla, Ghazipur and Bhalswa  -- under the three municipal corporations in Delhi. The meeting, chaired by the MoHUA secretary, was attended by senior officials of various ministries and organisations, Delhi Development Authority vice chairman, commissioners of all three corporations, representatives from Central Pollution Control Board, National Thermal Power Corporation, and National Highways Authority of India, the ministry said in a statement. The issue of legacy dumpsites across cities in India is a source of continuing environmental concern. The Swachh Bharat Mission-Urban (2.0) or SBM-U 2.0, being implemented by MoHUA, has taken up the challenge in a targeted manner, in a first of its kind initiative in the country.

The focus of SBM-U 2.0 is now on addressing both ends of the solid waste management chain vis-a-vis managing generation as well as safe disposal of municipal solid waste in a sustainable manner, to ensure that no new dumpsites are created going forward, and all legacy dumpsites are remediated. "Towards this end, the ministry has already approved dumpsite remediation projects worth Rs 4,152 crore to remediate 963 lakh metric tonnes of legacy dumpsites occupying nearly 5,700 acres in more than 600 urban local bodies across 14 states and UTs," the statement said. The approved amount includes projects worth Rs 776 crore to remediate 253 lakh metric tonnes covering 186 acres spanning across the three municipal corporations of Delhi, it said. "Of the approved amounts, central assistance of Rs 529 crore has already been released to states and UTs as first instalments, including Rs 174 crore released to the government of Delhi. As per financial norms of centrally-sponsored schemes, state and UT governments are required to put in matching share from their own side, while disbursing the funds to respective ULBs (urban local bodies)," the statement said.

The three municipal corporations reported that they collectively generate 11,000 tonnes a day of solid waste, of which approximately 5,900 tonnes a day are being scientifically processed, at present, at three waste-to-energy plants situated in Narela Bawana, Okhla and Ghazipur sites, it said. "At the three dumpsites, a total of approximately 42 lakh metric tonnes have been remediated till date, but the balance untreated fresh waste that continues to be dumped at these sites offsets whatever remediation has happened till now," the ministry said. "During today's meeting, it was emphasised that the key to attracting private sector participation in this sector was robust source segregation which would enable subsequent processing of waste. All municipal corporations in Delhi were urged to step up their efforts to segregate their waste at source," the statement said. "It was further decided that municipal corporations in Delhi and DDA would jointly discuss and settle all land-related issues in order to facilitate the remediation process. DDA was also requested to explore opportunities to use less than six mm fractions of inerts as soil enricher in their horticulture and bio-diversity parks, to the extent feasible," it said.

In terms of funding issues pertaining to remediation, it was decided that the Delhi government would explore possibilities for considering the "Green Cess Funds" for transportation of excavated legacy waste, since dumpsite remediation would contribute to reduction of air pollution in Delhi, the ministry said. "Parallelly, the municipal corporations in Delhi were requested to undertake detailed analysis for optimising process costs for dumpsite remediation, with comprehensive projectisation, and strong project monitoring measures. "It was also decided that the ministry would deploy an independent agency to study the monitoring mechanisms carried out in cities, including at Delhi and share the best practices of incorporating high-quality monitoring at sites," it said. As an immediate follow-up, the Delhi government was requested to disburse the central share of funds released by the ministry to all municipal corporations here, after adding the requisite UT share to the funds, the statement said. "Municipal corporations in Delhi were further requested to prepare detailed proposals for managing the fresh waste being generated daily and send the proposals to the ministry with due approval of the state government  so as to ensure that no additional dumpsites are created," it added. The ministry said that the SBM-U 2.0 is focusing on source segregation of solid waste, collection and transportation of the segregated waste fractions and ensuring compliance by bulk waste generators (entities generating more than 100 kg of waste per day) to manage their own waste. It also stressing on maximum resource recovery and scientific waste processing of all segregated fractions of waste (including plastic waste) to prevent untreated fresh waste from ending up in landfills, and "bio-remediating all legacy dumpsites across the country to recover 15,000 acres of prime real estate buried under nearly 16 crore tonnes of legacy waste", it said.

Along with this, mission has made a provision for "scientific landfills to dispose of untreated inerts and process rejects, to prevent fresh dumpsites being created", it said. "This has also been complemented by the directives of National Green Tribunal which has made it mandatory for all legacy dumpsites to be remediated in a time-bound manner. Parallely, MoHUA has been investing in focused capacity building and behaviour change interventions among all stakeholders to bolster these effort," the ministry said. 

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