Next October, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will shut the Gorai creek dumping ground using a new ‘capping technique’, ridding Borivli of not only a major eyesore and health risk but also earning Rs 1.3 crore by way of carbon credits.

Shutting of the dump thus is expected to cut Carbon Emission Rates or CER by 31,033 tonnes/ annum. If the BMC plan fructifies, which includes partial closure of two other dumps at Mulund and Deonar, by 2009 it may earn almost Rs 11.82 crore by trading CER of 2,81,508 tonnes/annum.

The burgeoning city’s population of 1.3 crore produces, on an average, 6,000 tonnes of municipal solid waste per day. It goes to the three dumping grounds at Deonar (4,000 tonnes/day), Mulund (600 tonnes/day) and Gorai (1,200 tonnes/day).

It was a Supreme Court directive to shut the Gorai dump as it had attained its highest capacity (1,200 tonnes/day) that got the BMC thinking out of the box.

Additional Municipal Commissioner (City) R A Rajeev, who is executing the project, points out that till now the BMC was only concerned about dumping the garbage. When one dump got full, they just looked for another site. “But with the SC directive, we thought of using a scientific closure method so that garbage dumps were as clean as other parts of the city. Since there were monetary benefits in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, we also thought of earning carbon credits,” he says.

One CER is equivalent to one tonne of carbon dioxide reduced. Under the Kyoto Protocol, governments and companies in the European Union can use these credits to offset their carbon emissions and meet part of their reduction targets. Carbon credits are generated mainly in the developing countries because of the lower project cost. India has cornered nearly 43 per cent of the carbon credits issued so far by the CDM (Clean Development Mechanism) Executive Board.

... contd.