Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has inaugurated the first Organic Waste to Energy Centre and the centre developed by BMC in collaboration with AeroCare Clean Energy was inaugurated by Aditya Thackeray on Friday.
According to the Maharashtra government, AeroCare’s decentralised organic waste processing centre is unique and the first of its kind which promotes zero waste to landfills. The plant will convert two metric tonnes of wet waste into 300 units of electricity per day, and the Rs 95-lakh plant is expected to generate enough power to support the street lighting of the area as well as a local garden. The plant, developed on an abandoned plot at Keshvrao Khade road near Haji Ali circle spread over 2,000 square feet, can generate 80 to 110 cubic meters of gas per day and 125 to 250 units of electricity per metric tonne of waste. CEO of AeroCare Clean Energy, Ankit Zaveri said, “We are delighted to be part of the government’s Organic Waste to Energy plan. The organic waste collected from bull waste generators (BWG) in the area will be processed at our centre to generate electricity which will be used to light up the garden area around,” he added. Biological methanation is a conversion process for generating methane through highly specialised microorganisms (archaea) within a technical system.
A conveyor belt is used to send wet waste to the mother digestor of the plant, which will then undergo hydrolysis, acidogenesis, acetogenesis, and methanogenesis to form methane gas. The gas is then stored in the balloon room, which is connected directly to the digester. 7,000-8,000 metric tonnes of garbage is generated in Mumbai every day, and solid waste is sent by the BMC to dumping grounds in Deonar and Kanjurmarg. The process of scientific closure of the Mulund dumping ground has already begun.
