Thiruvananthapuram's new menace: disposed beer bottles

Beer bottles discarded at residential areas and isolated spots pose health risks, besides clogging of water bodies.

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The city is facing yet another waste management crisis in the form of discarded beer bottles. Lanes of residential colonies and isolated spots in the city have become convenient locations for boozers to discard empty bottles. With the closure of bars, tipplers are finding it convenient to drink inside cars and discard the bottles on the road side. Many residents have complained about the cars slowing down at their gates in the night to throw bottles. Discarded bottles would soon roll on to nearby area and litter the entire pathway. Broken glass bottles harm children ,animals and pedestrians, and on days of heavy rain, it flows into water bodies.

Liquor bottle menace is a big issue in many parts of the city, acknowledged the Chairman of Health Standing Committee, K Sreekumar. He said that the corporation will soon a solution to curb the menace. “With the help of the Suchitwa Mission and the state government we collected plastic and glass waste from different parts of the city. It was a successful project and we are glad that many places are clean compared to the past," he said. The local body conducted two campaigns in February and March. Special counters were opened in different parts to collect glass bottles, electronic waste, tube lights etc. Along with collection points, corporation workers were deployed to collect broken glasses, bottles, electronic waste from public places and sewerage. In the first phase the local body collected 15 tonnes of glass waste and 6 tonnes of electronic waste. The program was held as part of 'my city, beautiful city' project. The collected waste were given to various agencies for recycling.

Though the local body said it would conduct the exercise periodically, the situation calls more for a proper mechanism than an adhoc one. Paraniyam Devakumar, patron of FRAT(Federation of Resident's Association Thiruvanathapuram said a new plan is afoot for effective waste management with the help of Corporation.

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

• Like plastics and paper, recycling is the key in used alcohol bottles too
• Recycling beer bottles is probably a good idea for healthy and useful  environment
• Experts say recycling glass requires significantly less energy than making it new, since less fossil fuel is used, which in turn means less pollution
• Recycling can help spare the use of lot of raw materials used to make new glass like limestone, which requires a lot of time, effort, and money to extract
• Like plastics and paper, recycling is the key in used alcohol bottles too
• Recycling beer bottles is probably a good idea for healthy and useful  environment
• Experts say recycling glass requires significantly less energy than making it new, since less fossil fuel is used, which in turn means less pollution
• Recycling can help spare the use of lot of raw materials used to make new glass like limestone, which requires a lot of time, effort, and money to extract

Health Risks

By throwing beer bottles into the trash instead of recycling them, one contributes to the massive garbage dumps. They also end up on water bodies and eventually oceans, which can harm the environment

With the help of the Suchitwa Mission and the state government we collected plastic and glass waste from different parts of the city. It was a successful project

 — K Sreekumar, Chairman of Health Standing Committee