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Better trash system6/27/2023 Nine thousand metric tonnes of waste ends here daily but the litter neither undergoes segregation nor processing. The Deonar landfill in Mumbai, India is Asia’s largest dumping ground – the size of 268 football fields. There’s no government health center in our community and many people don’t realize that pollution from the dump is what is causing health problems.” In an interview with Bloomberg, Owais, a citizen living close to Ghazipur said, “Most of us have health problems. Besides causing fires, pollution and landslides, the landfill is also a breeding ground for tuberculosis and dengue. On March 22, 2022, the Ghazipur dump leaked an estimated 2.17 metric tonnes of methane in an hour, according to Bloomberg. One of the most infamous dumps is the Ghazipur dump near New Delhi, spanning an area larger than what the Taj Mahal covers. Consequences of Improper Waste Management However, there has been no proper enforcement of the guidelines to date. According to Recycling Magazine, the government introduced solid waste management rules in 2016, which focused on recovery, reuse and recycling. The lack of publicly available bins, poorly covered garbage trucks and widespread littering by citizens only adds to the problem. ![]() The government, therefore, doesn’t restrict the informal recycling sector from operating in fear of political backlash from them. Moreover, these workers do not have adequate gear to protect themselves from hazardous and unsanitary materials, exposing them to skin and blood infections.Īccording to The New York Times, “ a few hundred thousand people earn income” from waste picking in Delhi. In fact, they often end up burning the waste in open areas for warmth on cold nights, causing pollution, according to Recycling Magazine. These workers, however, do not receive proper instructions on how to separate the trash into different categories. This is an abysmally small percentage.Īn important player in the waste segregation process is the informally trained waste or rag pickers coming from the nearby slums. India generates “62 million tonnes of municipal solid waste (MSW) annually.” Out of the 43 million tonnes of MSW collected, about 31 million tonnes end up in landfills while only 12 million tonnes undergo treatment. However, the lack of segregation of organic material at the source and the failure to use the waste for composting is a massive setback in solid waste. According to Bloomberg, in Indian landfills, about 60% of the waste is organic, such as leftover food, peelings of vegetables, livestock manure, etc. Organic waste that decomposes without the presence of oxygen produces methane. ![]() Deficiencies in India’s Waste Management System The problem does not lie with the landfills per se, but with India’s waste management system. These people are mostly from lower-income groups living in the slums, with little to no means to move to another location or change anything about their current situation. These toxic emissions from open-air landfills are not only adding to the problem of global warming but are also becoming an increasing health hazard for people living near the dumps. According to data that Kayrros SAS analyzed from images that the Sentinel-5P satellite sent, about 78 out of 82 units of methane released in India during the first six months of 2022 were primarily from landfills, livestock, agriculture and sewage. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas that is almost 84 times more potent in warming the atmosphere than carbon dioxide. The first half of 2022 saw India being the second-highest methane emitter in the world.
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