Biomethanation plants needs specific type of waste, says the official.
Biomethanation plants, also known as biogas plants, help in providing electricity to six different parks in Yediyur locality.
Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagar Palike (BBMP) Executive engineer of solid waste management department said, “BBMP will be upgrading, and re-opening seven existing biogas plants in June 2023.
BBMP will also open four new plants with the capacity of five tonnes, each by June 2023, and for that they have asked for Rs 10 crores from the government.
The official also stated that BBMP has asked for Rs five crores from the government to upgrade these plants. And these plants will be functioning with the capacity of five tonnes.
In 2014, BBMP opened 14 biogas plants in different parts of city, but 10 plants were closed due to lack of maintenance and funding. And the rest four were working at a very low capacity of one-two tonnes instead of five tonnes, he added.
At an interval of every three years, these plants need to be maintained for proper functioning apart from this, they also need a specific type of waste to be processed.
According to Sridhar, an environmentalist at Bengaluru Environment Trust, a possible reason for a plant to shut down can be that the quality of wet waste was not maintained.
These plants can only process biodegradable wastes like kitchen waste, paper, grass, cow dung, and dry leaves. They offer “Zero garbage and Zero effluent.” They provide high quality manure, and methane gas which are used in generating electricity. The electricity generated by these plants is then used in street lights.
Street light near biogas plant get electricity from the plant.
One kg of waste is able to produce 22.03 litres of biogas, and five tonnes of waste can produce 1, 10,150 litres of biogas. But not all biogas can produce electricity. 1 m3 (1000 litre) of biogas can produce 2.76 kWh/h of electricity and 3.3kWh/h of heat. 1kWh is equal to one hour of electricity usage at a rate of 1kW. And the heat produced by biogas plant can be used in heat appliances.
A resident of Yediyur also said that the plants produce some smell in the surroundings, but not very frequently.
Every biogas plants need daily maintenance. But they don’t have serious environmental issues. “The waste used should be segregated properly for good quality of biogas. For this the segregation should be done well by the waste collectors and the waste producers. And if the quality of waste is poor then the gas produced won’t be effective enough.” said an environmentalist.
He added that the waste collectors should be trained properly, supervisors should be careful, and the quality check should be done on a weekly basis for a better product.
