MARGAO
Strange it may seem but true that a solid waste treatment plant set up to treat waste and churn out compost is generating methane gas.
In fact, recurring fires inside the Sonsodo waste treatment plant seemed to have come to stay, with the authorities in no haste to cart away the accumulated waste running into thousands of tonnes.
A year has elapsed now since the Margao Municipal Council has been unloading the daily wet waste inside the waste treatment plant with no scientific treatment worth its name taking place over the last one year. Result: The waste treatment plant, which was meant to treat daily wet waste via the windrow method and churn out compost is only producing methane gas, the cause behind the recurring fires. While fire and smoke has stopped billowing from the over-half a century old legacy dump now with the Goa Waste Management Corporation (GWMC) on the job to remediate the 2.31 lakh metric tonnes of waste, recurring fires inside the waste treatment plant has now become the order of the day.
Chief Officer Agnelo Fernandes and senior civic officials may have downplayed the recurring fires on the plea that generation of methane gas is bound to give rise to fires. The Municipal babus, however, have no explanation why waste treatment will generate methane gas when its avowed objective is to churn out compost.
Take note, the GWMC had carted away thousands of tonnes of accumulated waste from the Sonsodo plant during the first phase of Covid-19 pandemic early last year to pave way for the civic body to start scientific treatment of the daily waste via the windrow method after repairing the plant and machinery.
Sadly, the same plant has again reached a point of saturation, with space being created by compacting the waste with the help of heavy
machinery.
Says GWMC Managing Director Levinson Martins: “I am not surprised if the Sonsodo plant is again full with waste. The GWMC had proposed carting away of the accumulated waste from the plant last year with a two-fold objective: One, to make space for daily wet waste at the plant and to start scientific treatment of the waste. I had drafted one of our engineers at the Sonsodo to guide the civic body on the treatment of the daily waste, but somehow there was no seriousness from the civic body to address the issue.”
MMC officials pointed out that they have proposed to float a tender to engage a contractor to cart away the existing waste and also remediate the same. The tender, however, has still not seen the light of day after the government raised a host of queries in respect of the rates.
A decision to float a tender to rope in a contractor to cart away the waste and rid the plant of the waste was adopted at the July 9 meeting of the civic body, but in vain.
Carting away tonnes of waste from plant may take months: official
MARGAO: Carting away the thousands of tonnes of accumulated waste inside the Sonsodo plant may take some time, if not months, officials informed.
Otherwise, consider this. The MMC had proposed some time back to float a tender to cart away the existing waste from the waste treatment plant. The government, however, has shot down the proposal on grounds that the proposed rates are on a higher side.
Given the situation, the civic body is now bracing up to float an Expression of Interest (EoI) to rope in experts to prepare the estimates for the work before floating the tender.
Officials in private admit that the process of inviting EoI and to float a tender to engage a contractor may consume lot of time. And, given that the election code of conduct may come into force by year-end, the project to cart away the waste may take some time.
