Coimbatore: The Coimbatore Corporation is all geared up to make the city clean and green, with the CCMC Commissioner Sravan Kumar Jatavath clearly charting the course. Reducing the waste that gets dumped at Vellalore is to be the ultimate goal that CCMC is looking to achieve.
Coimbatore: The Coimbatore Corporation is all geared up to make the city clean and green, with the CCMC Commissioner Sravan Kumar Jatavath clearly charting the course. Reducing the waste that gets dumped at Vellalore is to be the ultimate goal that CCMC is looking to achieve.
Addressing the media at the CCMC building today, Sravan Kumar Jatavath said, "On an average, Coimbatore city generates 1000 mt waste per day. Facilities to process 500 mt waste is already there at Vellalore. 100 mt will go into vermi composting. 15-20 mt goes to biogas production.
To handle the rest and to reduce waste being dumped at Vellalore, 69 micro composting centres are coming up in various wards. 19 centres are ready with machine and equipment. By September 12, centres including OCC will come into operation. Once these centres come into place, waste from the respective wards will go to these MCCs and OCCs where composting will be done, reducing the load on Vellalore. Solid waste management is a top priority for CCMC," he added.
"The key to solid waste management is source segregation. People should start segregating waste at their residences. To help people in this regard, the Corporation is purchasing 102 Tata Ace vehicles to ensure door-to-door collection. Funds for 280 vehicles got sanctioned after the NGT visit last week. These vehicles will go to the specified wards and their movement will be tracked through an online tracking system. Green vehicles are meant for wet waste collection which will come daily and Blue vehicles are for dry waste collection which will collect waste twice a week.
Blue vehicles will not collect wet waste and hence people will have to separate their waste compulsorily on a daily basis. Collected wet waste will be sent to MCCs where composting will be done using scientific methods. In the long run, we can reduce waste getting dumped at Vellalore. This will also help prevention of fire breaking out at the Vellalore dump yard in the future," added the Commissioner.
Speaking on plans for Vellalore, the Commissioner said, "In the 650-acre area, 100- 150 acres area holds the waste at present. To handle legacy waste, Corporation is considering various latest technologies including bio mining and the final decision will be taken by the Government, depending on the city's needs. To avoid fire accidents, grids have been constructed to enable easy access. A sump of 5 lakh litres has been constructed to store water to use in case the need arises, and an overhead tank of 2 lakh litres capacity will also be constructed to aid the process. Vellalore has been transforming into a green space with 1000s of trees being planted. Even tomorrow, 6000 saplings will be planted to convert Vellalore into a green park shortly," he added.
The Commissioner also hinted on a user fee for waste collection but did not chart out a time line for the same. "Even in cities like Indore, user fee has been collected. To enable the Corporation to offer better services, a minimum user fee will do good but nothing has been finalised as of now," stated Sravan Kumar.
The Commissioner further talked about handling waste of bulk generators which is about a 100 mt. "Residential apartments have already been given notices to handle their own waste. They can go for on site composting in their campuses or work with players like "No dumping" to handle their waste. Hotels were also asked to find solutions to handle their waste and to help them, a conclave will be held shortly as a hand-holding exercise," reiterated the Commissioner. "With all these measures and the participation of the people, Coimbatore will become a cleaner city," opined a confident CCMC Commissioner.