India Sits On Trash Pile: Can It Turn It Into Gold, Generate Biogas And Keep Home Fires Burning?

Now imagine, even if half of this waste is directed towards production of biogas, it could not only expand generation of renewable energy exponentially, but keep the home fires burning. The problem is that this much of this trash is not being put to use. 

Biogas is an effective replacement for Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), primarily used for cooking.

Clearly, India which imports more than 60% of its LPG requirements, now needs to aggressively put in place policy measures to effectively convert its massive waste into productive use. India ranks among the top countries producing municipal solid waste.

Crisis As Impetus

Escalation of the West Asian crisis has severely impacted the global energy sector, including LPG, pushing up prices.

Sources in the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) said that the issue has been taken up internally. “While we have been generating energy from waste, this will be taken up on a war footing and we are looking at policy measures that will even encourage family biogas plants,” a senior official of the ministry said.

The waste to energy formula is not only beneficial to the environment, it will be effective for waste management, especially for the smaller towns and rural areas.

Though India has been looking at biogas as an efficient alternative to LPG, the pick-up has not been even. This is despite the government providing Central Financial Assistance (CFA) under the Biogas Programme for setting up for small family biogas plants. The amount could range between ₹10,000 to over ₹70,000. The subsidy amount differs – the sum is larger for large sized plants.

A small biogas plant can easily provide cooking fuel for about five hours. This is sufficient to support a family of four. 

According to the Indian Biogas Association, though India has about five million small biogas plants “a large number of them remain non-operational due to lack of social and technical support.”

That apart, the need of the hour is to provide cheaper loans for such biogas projects which are primarily driven by use of waste.

"India generates tonnes of municipal solid waste per day-- much of it organic, yet most of it is not routed into biogas. Studies estimate that crop residues alone in the Indo‑Gangetic Plain could yield 1,165 million m³ of biogas annually, but most of it is burned or left to rot," Gaurav Kedia, Chairman, Indian Biogas Association told The Secretariat. 

Besides the small plants, there are about 150 large compressed biogas plants as well.

As per estimates only two million small biogas plants are actually producing gas today, despite the huge installed base.

Kedia said that lack of skilled manpower for operation and maintenance of the plants, faulty waste segregation at source and weak feedstock logistics among others have led to the problem.

"In short, we have a waste surplus, but its faulty collection and treatment have made it difficult," he said. 

Waste To Energy

States such as Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, and Delhi are leading the waste to energy projects. However, this exercise needs urgent focus and other states must be directed to expand their waste to energy initiatives.  

“It is clear that the subsidy model has not delivered the desired results, what we need is cheaper and accessible bank credit to set up these plants,” SB Dangayach, Founder Trustee, Innovative Thought Forum said.

Earlier, The Secretariat reported that though availability of cooking gas is being managed, a continued crisis in Iran could lead to problems affecting the social welfare programmes including the government’s flagship Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana (PMUY) scheme.

The Centre has already pressed the pedal to diversify its market for sourcing energy requirements including LPG.

Countries such as Russia, Argentina and Brazil among others have increased their supplies of LPG to India. While market diversification is key, converting its trash into energy is an opportunity for India. It needs to act.