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India – Waste Generation Scenario
Every year, about 55 million tonnes of municipal solid waste (MSW) and 38 billion liters of sewage are generated in the urban areas of India. In addition, large quantities of solid and liquid wastes are generated by industries. Waste generation in India is expected to increase rapidly in the future. As more people migrate to urban areas and as incomes increase, consumption levels are likely to rise, as are rates of waste generation. It is estimated that the amount of waste generated in India will increase at a per capita rate of approximately 1-1.33% annually. This has significant impacts on the amount of land that is and will be needed for disposal, economic costs of collecting and transporting waste, and the environmental consequences of increased MSW generation levels.
Types of Waste
Waste can be broadly classified into
- Urban Waste
- Industrial Waste
- Biomass Waste
- Biomedical Waste
Urban waste includes Municipal Solid Waste, Sewage and Fecal Sludge, whereas industrial waste could be classified as Hazardous industrial waste and Non-hazardous industrial waste.
More on the types of wastes from here.
Why Waste to Energy is Important?
Most wastes that are generated, find their way into land and water bodies without proper treatment, causing severe water pollution. They also emit greenhouse gases like methane and carbon dioxide, and add to air pollution. Any organic waste from urban and rural areas and industries is a resource due to its ability to get degraded, resulting in energy generation.
The problems caused by solid and liquid wastes can be significantly mitigated through the adoption of environment-friendly waste-to-energy technologies that will allow treatment and processing of wastes before their disposal. These measures would reduce the quantity of wastes, generate a substantial quantity of energy from them, and greatly reduce environmental pollution. India’s growing energy deficit is making the government central and state governments become keen on alternative and renewable energy sources. Waste to energy is one of these, and it is garnering increasing attention from both the central and state governments.
While the Indian Government’s own figures would suggest that the cost of waste to energy is somewhat higher than other renewable sources, it is still an attractive option, as it serves a dual role of waste disposal and energy production.
India Waste to Energy Potential
According to the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), there exists a potential of about 1700 MW from urban waste (1500 from MSW and 225 MW from sewage) and about 1300 MW from industrial waste. The ministry is also actively promoting the generation of energy from waste, by providing subsidies and incentives for the projects. Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency (IREDA) estimates indicate that India has so far realized only about 2% of its waste-to-energy potential. A market analysis from Frost and Sullivan predicts that the Indian municipal solid waste to energy market could be growing at a compound annual growth rate of 9.7% by 2013.
More about Waste to Energy Potential in India
Technologies for the Generation of Energy from Waste
Energy can be recovered from the organic fraction of waste (biodegradable as well as non-biodegradable) through thermal, thermo-chemical, biochemical and electrochemical methods.
(i) Thermal Conversion: The process involves thermal degradation of waste under high temperature. In this complete oxidation of the waste occurs under high temperature. The major technological option under this category is incineration. But incineration has been losing attention these days because of its emission characteristics.
(ii) Thermo-chemical conversion: This process entails high temperature driven decomposition of organic matter to produce either heat energy or fuel oil or gas. They are useful for wastes containing high percentage of organic non-biodegradable matter and low moisture content. The main technological options under this category include Pyrolysis and Gasification. The products of these processes (producer gas, exhaust gases etc) can be used purely as heat energy or further processed chemically, to produce a range of end products.
(iii) Bio-chemical conversion: This process is based on enzymatic decomposition of organic matter by microbial action to produce methane gas, and alcohol etc. This process, on the other hand, is preferred for wastes having high percentage of organic, bio-degradable (putrescible) matter and high level of moisture/ water content, which aids microbial activity. The major technological options under this category are anaerobic digestion (bio-methanation) and fermentation. Of the two, anaerobic digestion is the most frequently used method for waste to energy, and fermentation is emerging.
(iv) Electrochemical conversion: Electrochemical conversion in the context of waste to energy refers typically to microbial fuel cells (MFC). These systems are developed to trap the energy from wastes, where the reduction-oxidation machinery of immobilized microbial cells is catalytically exploited, for the accelerated transfer of electrons from organic wastes, to generate electricity and bio-hydrogen gas. However this methodology needs extensive evaluation studies on bulk scale liquid waste treatments and stands at a nascent level in India as well as worldwide.
More on the technological routes for generating energy from waste
Indian Government Support for Waste to Energy
The Indian Government has recognized waste to energy as a renewable technology and supports it through various subsidies and incentives. The Ministry of New and Renewable Energy is actively promoting all the technology options available for energy recovery from urban and industrial wastes. MNRE is also promoting the research on waste to energy by providing financial support for R&D projects on cost sharing basis in accordance with the R&D Policy of the MNRE. In addition to that, MNRE also provides financial support for projects involving applied R&D and studies on resource assessment, technology up-gradation and performance evaluation.
Specific data on the government support for waste to energy projects can be obtained from here.
A number of key statistics, such as the value of recyclables, the amount of environmental pollution from waste sources, and the quantity of industrial waste generated, need to be computed to gain a better understanding of this sector. In terms of research related to waste to energy, detailed analysis of costs and available funding is needed.