The residents of Sukhdev Vihar in south Delhi are battling toxic ash from the nearby Jindal waste-to-energy plant. Investigations show that many legal norms were flouted with impunity
By Shamir Reuben
Captain RS Choudhry, a 78-year-old resident of Sukh-dev Vihar in South Delhi has spent a stressful winter. He recounts how difficult it has been to breath. “I haven’t been able to go out of my house for a walk for nearly two years,” he says gasping. “My doctor says my lungs can’t absorb oxygen because of a medical condition I developed a few years ago. The only time I go out of the house is to go in a car to visit the doctor. Even a few steps make me breathless and I can’t even climb the stairs,” he says.
Adding to his misery is a waste-to-energy plant nearby, which has hit the headlines in the last few years for the environment and health damage it is causing. “I have seen black matter flying outside. Sometimes it enters the house and the walls turn black. Hamaara time toh aa hee gaya matlab (My time is almost up),” he says with a weak smile. “I don’t ask for the plant to be moved; all I ask is for authorities to ensure that it causes no more damage.”
The plant puts the lives of residents in next-door localities like Ghaffar Manzil in danger
The problem stretches back to the late 1980s when Delhi was staring at the dual dilemma of power shortages and a lack of proper waste disposal mechanisms. Sensing that the problem would escalate with time, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi was on the lookout for an effective solution. Potential reprieve came in the form of a new technology called refuse-driven-power-generation (RDF), which offered to solve Delhi’s aforementioned concerns by processing municipal waste to produce electricity, an almost irresistible proposition.
AMBITIOUS MOVE
Soon, a `25-crore agreement was struck with Denmark and a refuse-incineration-driven power plant that would produce 3.75 MW of electricity after processing 300 tons of waste daily was imported with technical assistance from Danish firm Volund Miljotecknik. It came up in 1987 in Timarpur. The ambitious initiative looked set to revolutionize India’s waste management.
Just six months later, the plant was forced to shut down, though officially itwas declared closed in 1990. It was found that for the plant to function at full efficiency and provide optimal output, the calorific value of the waste required was 1,462.5 k-cal/kg. But after buying the plant, setting it up and starting operations, the MCD woke up to the fact that Delhi’s waste had a calorific value of only 600-900k-cal/kg. It was almost like buying an expensive piggy bank and then realizing there were no coins to put in it.
Unfortunately, waste-incinerators were also started in Hyderabad, Vijaywada, Luck-now and Chandigarh. All of them were eventually shut down.
However, a plan for a new Timarpur-Okhla waste incineration plant was already in the pipeline by mid-2000. It proposed a “new and improved version” on the old Timarpur site, and an additional plant in Okhla. The renovation of the Timarpur plant was later scrapped. Jindal Ecopolis submitted its bid for the Okhla plant on January 24, 2008, and the shareholder agreement was signed on February 22, 2008. This was called the Jindal’s Waste-to-Energy (WTE) plant. It has spelt havoc to the health of residents of Sukhdev Vihar and neighboring colonies in Okhla and has seen vehement opposition from various quarters, be it in the form of rallies, a PIL, 27 non-hearings in the Delhi High Court, multiple National Green Tribunal hearings, a TV segment on Satyamev Jayate, a letter from then environment minister Jairam Ramesh to Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and more than 80 letters from doctors in neighboring hospitals raising concerns about the plant’s toxic exhausts. Yet, Jindal Ecopolis’ WTE plant continues its operations undeterred.
SERIOUS NEGLIGENCE
“On certain days, the sky turns black,” says Ranjit Devraj, a journalist and resident of Sukhdev Vihar. “There is an entire block of flats which is empty, because no one wants to live there. Switching on the cooler will leave black spots all over the house. And to think we have been fighting this for more than four years.” From Devraj’s terrace, the plant is visible even through the thick blanket of fog. “It is obvious that there cannot be a plant like this near a residential area. The distance between the compound wall of the colony and the plant is merely 200 meters.”
The list of infringements doesn’t end there. The Environmental Impact Assess-ment (EIA), a mandatory document to be submitted by any plant to the Delhi Pollution Control Committee for any industry to come up, was submitted in April 2006. However, Jindal did not submit a new EIA as required by law. A number of other inconsistencies have been found by multiple publications, as well as institutions like the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, which consists of over 600 NGOs, grassroots organizations and individuals in over 90 countries.
The biodegradable waste in India can be converted into compost at a much cheaper cost. What was the need to set up a massive plant to burn it instead?
These include:
- The executive summary of the report proposed that the project would include a power plant, bio-methanation plant, a bio-digester and a processing plant that converts municipal solid waste (MSW) to RDF fluff. As of today, the facility still has neither a biomethanation plant, nor the bio-digester; and the plant that changes MSW to RDF fluff is also essentially fluff. The report states that the biogas produced by the bio-methanation plant would be used as auxiliary fuel for the boilers, but since there is no bio-methanation plant, what fuels are the boilers using?
- The initial report also states that the estimated calorific value of the waste will be between 2,500-3,000 kcal/kg. But the estimated value of the waste now is around 1,400 kcal/kg.
- The report states that there is no immediate threat to the environment. This, despite the Okhla Bird Sanctuary being about 2 km away. Moreover, the initial environmental assessment itself reveals that three of the five quality monitoring stations placed in and around the plant showed that suspended particulate matter (SPM) levels greatly exceeded national ambient air quality standards even before the plant was constructed. Why was the plant allowed an environmental clearance then?
IRRESPONSIBLE OPERATORS
In 2011, a year after the Okhla plant started operations, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) held a meeting with eminent officials, including Allard Nooy, CEO, Timar-pur Okhla Waste Management Company, Dr Chetna, scientist, Department of Environ-ment, government of Delhi, IIT-Delhi, DPCC and the Delhi Jal board. The committee raised concerns regarding the plant, which can be found on the CPCB website.
These were:
- Apprehensions about effective segregation of plastics in manual recovery operations
- Lack of clarity on disposal of ash and effluent generation
- Impact of the project in the existing scenario wherein ambient air quality norms are already exceeding
- Micro-level environmental impacts that are not addressed in the EIA report
- Operational limitations
Three years on, nothing has changed. The website of the plant states that the fly ash generated is used to make bricks. However, it is a fact that ambient air quality has visible fly ash and waste segregation leaves a lot to be desired.
Monitoring stations in and around the plant found presence of suspended particulate matter much above the acceptable limit.
In 2011, a six-member expert panel even made a surprise visit to the plant to inspect pollution levels. The permissible limit of dioxins and furan levels in Boiler Stack 1 had to be 0.1 ng TEQ/NM^3. How-ever, inspection revealed that the actual level was a shocking 12.413 units. Boiler Stack 2 also exceeded limits with 2.758 ng level. Incidentally, dioxins and furans are some of the most toxic substances known to man and are capable of causing serious health conditions such as respiratory complications, liver failure and even cancer. In animals, dioxins are known to cause wasting syndrome or delayed death. So what could be the effect on the Okhla bird sanctuary nearby?
In similar WTE projects, dioxins and furans are superheated to neutralize chemical bonds, rendering them useless. Speaking to Spiegel.de, a German online weekly, Joachim Beyer, head of the hazard waste incineration department at Bayer Industry Services (Germany), said the process requ-ires intensive care. The process does not end with superheating the compounds to 1,000-1,200 degree Celsius. To prevent recombination of these toxins after cooling, the WTE plant utilizes multiple combustion chambers, rotation washers and a catalytic converter larger than 98 feet. A similar plant—AVG Hazardous WTE plant in Hamburg—which has a capacity of 890 tons per day, required an initial investment of 186 million Euros way back in 1994. The Jindal plant with a capacity of 1,300 tons daily, reportedly had an initial investment of just 26.6 million Euros. Has the plant compromised on safety with such a cost difference?
WRONG METHODS
“What defies my understanding is, why would anyone burn biodegradable waste?” asks Satwik Mudgal, senior research associate, industry and environment, Centre for Science and Environment. “A composting plant, even an exorbitant, world-class facility, would cost around `50 lakh at the most. Indian waste composition is different; it would make more sense to spend less money and build a composting plant than burn it altogether.”
He adds: “I spoke to the GM of Timarpur Okhla Waste Management Ltd a few years back. I asked him whether they burnt mixed waste, and he said yes. I further asked him, whether they are burning biomedical waste and other biodegradable material. He said yes again.”
When contacted, the current executive director of the plant, Rakesh Kumar Aggar-wal, refused to talk to this reporter and hung up on two occasions.
Until a few months back, the Jindal plant wasn’t the only culprit contributing to Okhla’s woes. Synergy’s Biomedical Inciner-ator in the same locality was also in a legal tangle with the residents of Sukhdev Vihar. After several high court hearings and a contempt of court, the plant was forced to shut down in December 2014. Ironically, every legal infringement that this plant was acc-used of also applied to the Jindal plant. If a smaller incinerator can be shut down, how is a larger one being allowed to function?
Meanwhile, the residents of Okhla are girding up for a big fight. They have a Facebook page called “Okhla ka Ghosla” and hold protest rallies on a regular basis. But it looks like a long fight ahead.