BBMP plans food waste crushers while sewage crumbles

The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike(BBMP) proposes to make Food waste crushers a compulsory addition to every new household in the city. A plan, which will 'create a disaster' according to experts, as the city sewage system is not equipped to handle the load.

The BBMP proposes the people to adopt food waste crushers, which is an electrical food waste disposer. It can be attached to a Kitchen sink and its blades will grind the garbage into a liquid form, which will be drained out to the sewage. The food waste crusher will cost around Rs 5,000 in the market.

The experts, however, urge for a review before adopting such a system. S Ramakanth, president of solid waste management roundtable (SWMRT), said, "The sewage and the water drainage system in the city are in such a bad condition that it can't even handle the rainwater and the present volume of sewage water. How does the BBMP expect that the garbage wastewater from these crushers will be managed by our BWSSB sewage system? Eventually, it will be discharged into lakes and add to the stink. This will create a disaster for the environment and our lakes."

Ramakanth questioned the implementation of these projects without a proper study and research. "The decomposition of the wet waste into manure is the only environment-friendly procedure and BBMP should at least follow this procedure properly. There are a lot of problems in the Solid waste management plants and collecting garbage in the city. BBMP should focus on solving these problems. All these programmes lack a study and research before implementation by civic authorities."

The BBMP Mayor, R Sampath Raj, however, says, "Food waste crushers will help reduce the garbage waste in the city. This will be implemented at new houses on a trial basis. The city generates a lot of garbage which may not be collected on time, at least these crushers will bring down the garbage accumulation and the diseases spread by garbage".