Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Incineration of 300 MT chemical waste lying in Union Carbide Corporation (UCC) plant site will generate around 900 MT- three times more – residue at Ramky Enviro Engineers Limited (REEL) at Pithampur.
There is around 337MT toxic waste at the UCC plant site. The High Court has instructed the state government to clean up the chemical waste.
The 4th oversight meeting was held on June 19, 2023 under chairmanship of Union minister for environment, forest and climate change Bhupendra Yadav to examine all pros and cons and chalk out a blueprint for scientifically disposal of UCC chemical waste.
In the meeting, a sum of Rs 126 crore was sanctioned to the MP Government for waste disposal. Trial incineration of 10 MT out of 347 MT was carried out for five days in Pithampur’s plant in August 2015 following Supreme Court directives. The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) had reported that all environmental parameters were within the prescribed standard.
As per the present plan, incineration will test feed rates 135kg/h,180kg/h, 270kg/h and then actual feed rate for incineration will be decided. Rachna Dhingra of Bhopal Group of Information and Action (BGIA) said that incineration of waste will be another major issue as it will generate three times more residue at REEL, Pithampur.
“Earlier, between 2010 and 2015, six out of seven trial runs of incineration of toxic waste conducted at Pithampur facility failed as it released dioxins and furans at a rate of 16 times above the permissible limit. The last trial run of 2015 of 10MT of UCC waste passed and it was being monitored by the same Central and MP Pollution Control Boards who have not ever reported any contamination of soil and groundwater near Pithampur TSDF facility,” the activist said.
