CHENNAI: Southern Railways (Chennai division) has prioritised solid waste management by attempting to dispose the waste generated at its stations in an efficient manner. A waste to energy plant, with a capacity to generate 229 units of power everyday, will soon come up near the Central station.
The upcoming facility, for which a New Delhi based firm has been chosen as contractor, will take waste generated by stations and railway establishments at Central, Madras Moore Market Complex, Egmore and Basin Bridge. The plant will have a capacity to process 15 lakh tonnes of garbage.
“For the above purpose, railways has already introduced a two-bin concept at both Central and Egmore stations to separate bio-degradable waste from the rest,” a divisional railway official told Express. He added that an agreement with the firm will be signed soon, following which work is most likely to start by next month. As part of the fortnight long special cleanliness campaign (Swachhta Pakhwada), held from August 16 to 31, a series of events took place to highlight the importance of cleanliness. Around 850 volunteers, from schools, colleges and NGOs, participated in the campaign.
Public awareness campaigns on bio-toilets installed in trains were held. Out of the 1550 coaches maintained by Chennai division, bio-toilets have been installed in 650 coaches with officials stating the rest would be covered within a year’s time.Anti-littering drives have been conducted at various railway stations. A total of 1206 persons were booked for littering and an amount of `2,53,000 has been collected as fines. Also, mechanised cleaning, presently used in Central and Egmore, will be introduced at Tambaram soon.
What
A waste-to-energy plant, with a capacity to generate 229 units of power everyday, is set to come up near Chennai Central soon
Challenges
Waste generated from railway stations are generally mixed, and difficult to segregate.
Lack of public awareness is a key factor as many do not seperate bio-degradable waste from the rest. The railways has introduced a two-bin concept at both Central and Egmore stations for this purpose.
41,000
Railways has set an ambitious plan to save D41,000 crore on electricity charges with switch to renewable sources of energy