Bhandewadi Dumping Yard that witnessed massive fire a couple of days ago was a stark reminder that Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC) needs to be prepared for such incidents during summers. The fire emits greenhouse gases even as people living around the site were advised by the civic body to stay indoors until the fire was put out. These are very short-term measures; preventing these fires altogether requires long-term measures, including thorough and sustained interventions from NMC. On Monday, the Fire and Emergency Services Department of NMC was still struggling to douse the fire and the civic body was clueless about the cause of the fire, which engulfed 10 acre area of the dumping yard.

 

“The firefighting efforts are still underway as 6-7 fire tenders are working day and night to extinguish the fire on the upper side of garbage hill,” Dr Gajendra Mahalle, Deputy Commissioner, Solid Waste Management Department of NMC told ‘The Hitavada’. Despite this huge fire incident, the civic body seems to be clueless about the reason and it has no further plan to curb such incidents in Bhandewadi in future. The civic body has no long-term measures to curb such fires in Bhandewadi. When asked about the long-term measures to curb fire incidents in dumping yards, a scientist of CSIR-NEERI mentioned that proper segregation of garbage was the most important factor. “In India, only 30-40% of waste generated is processed at its best. So unprocessed waste remains in open landfills for long periods. Such waste may have flammable material like low-quality plastics, chemicals, etc. The low-quality plastics, which have relatively higher calorific value of about 2,500-3,000 kcal/kg as compared to coal, which has around 8,000 kcal/kg, can catch fire easily during the summer season,” said the scientist.

 

“Through proper segregation, the administration can keep such flammable material away from normal garbage. Along with this, the civic body should also install sprinkler system and fire detection system in the yard for early control of fire,” said the scientist. The most vulnerable part of the landfill - the portion with lots of plastics and other flammable waste, should be capped with soil. It will help to reduce the chances of fire incidents, said the expert. After the fire incident, heaps of ash is left behind whose removal is also a big challenge for the civic body.

 

Meanwhile, NMC has no plan to remove the ash from the dumping yard and they may use it in bio-mining process. Whereas, the scientist said, “The ash may contain residue of poisonous metal, which is harmful to utilise in any landfills. There is a need to scientifically utilise and remove the ash to avoid any other hazardous incident.” It will take one or two more days to control the fire completely in Bhandewadi dumping yard. The civic body is putting in efforts to stop the fire, but there is a need to plan long-term measures at administration level.