New Delhi: Of the more than 14,000 tonnes per day (TPD) of municipal solid waste (MSW) generated in Delhi and the National Capital Region (NCR), only 10,729 TPD is processed, leaving a little over 3,000 TPD waste untreated every day. This has resulted in the piling of legacy waste in the region, with more than 321 lakh metric ton (LMT) dumped at various landfill sites and only 150.12 LMT getting treated.
This and more such details related to waste management in Delhi and NCR are part of a central government affidavit filed in the Supreme Court.
Taking note of the affidavit, a bench led by Justice Abhay S. Oka Monday termed the situation of solid waste management in Delhi, Gurugram, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, Alwar and Greater Noida, as “horrible”. The court is hearing an old public interest litigation (PIL) on rising pollution levels in the national capital and nearby areas.
The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs affidavit came after the top court on 22 April directed it to convene a meeting to take stock of the implementation of the Municipal Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016.
In response the ministry said that the responsibility to ensure implementation of the rules lies with urban local bodies and urban development departments of the respective state governments.
Pursuant to the top court’s order, the ministry held three meetings with the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) and municipal bodies of Delhi, Gurugram, Faridabad, Alwar and Greater Noida.
On a perusal of the affidavit, the bench, also comprising Justice Ujjal Bhuyan, observed that non-treatment of such a huge amount of solid waste in Delhi is a violation of the fundamental right of citizens to live in a pollution-free environment. The bench pressed the need for immediate measures to ensure the quantity of untreated solid waste does not increase till proper facilities are put in place to treat it.
One of the suggestions mooted by the bench was to halt ongoing construction activity — among the primary sources of waste production in the NCR. The court directed the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs to come up with a solution to resolve, in its view, “a very vital issue” for Delhi.
The ministry’s affidavit revealed that of the 8,627 metric tonnes (MT) of construction and demolition (C&D) waste generated in NCR each day, a little over 3,600 MT remains unprocessed.
In Delhi alone, the daily waste generation in all the three jurisdictions — Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), New Delhi Municipal Council and Delhi Cantonment Board — is about 11,342 TPD and the legacy waste is 280 LMT. But only 8,073 TPD is processed, while around 3,800 TPD of fresh waste is dumped at the two dumpsites, Ghazipur and Bhalswa.
According to the affidavit, new facilities to be set up at five more places in the next four years will increase the processing capacity of waste generation to 15,473 TPD. Plans are also in the pipeline for 100 percent remediation of legacy waste, but that too would be fully operational till December 2027.
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Municipal solid waste generated in Delhi-NCR
Delhi generates around 6,000 TPD construction and demolition waste, of which 1,000 TPD remains untreated. Bids have been invited for earmarking seven acres of reclaimed land at a sanitary landfill in Okhla for a new plant so that the entire waste generated is processed.
While Gurugram sees a daily waste generation of 1,200 TPD, the current processing capacity is only 150 TPD. Work for management of municipal solid waste in the millennium city was allotted to a private firm, but due to a breach of contract on its part, Gurugram authorities have terminated the concession agreement with it. A fresh tender will be processed within the next six months to a new company and work is likely to be commissioned by January 2025 to it. A new plant to process the daily waste will be installed by December 2026, discloses the central government’s affidavit.
Similarly, in Faridabad the gap between the daily waste generated and disposed of is more than 700 TPD. Authorities there have implemented short-term measures and a proper plant will be commissioned by December 2026 to meet the shortfall, it added.
Each of the satellite towns has legacy waste of 33 LMT and in both 16.41 LMT has been remediated. The remaining quantity of 16.59 LMT is expected to be processed by December end, the affidavit said.
It also said daily generation of construction and demolition waste in Gurugram is 1,500 TPD, of which only 600 is processed. A proposal to have another plant of 1,000 TPD capacity is under approval of the Committee of Secretaries on Infrastructure and the same will be commissioned by August 2025.
In Faridabad, however, there is no facility to dispose of 300 TPD of construction waste.
In Uttar Pradesh’s Ghaziabad and Greater Noida, the estimated quantity of municipal solid waste generated is 1,950 TPD. While the processing capacity in Ghaziabad is more than the waste production, Noida’s shortfall is 218 TPD.The total legacy waste assessed in Ghaziabad is 2.69 LMT, of which 1.46 LMT has been remediated, whereas in greater Noida it is 3.69 MLT. As for the C&D waste, Ghaziabad is for now well equipped to match the daily generation of 325 TPD, but Greater Noida still lacks the facility to dispose of 100-500 TDP produced every day, said the affidavit.
The facility to process daily municipal waste in Rajasthan’s Alwar can treat 134 of the 180 TPD municipal waste, but at present the plant is unable to treat 129 TPD and will become fully operational by September 2024. Legacy waste in Alwar will be processed completely by August 2024. However, there is no plant to cater to the C&D waste generation in the city.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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