Zero Waste Management Initiative at Coimbatore Airport
Coimbatore International Airport, Coimbatore Corporation
and Residents Awareness Association of Coimbatore (RAAC) have initiated
zero waste management at the airport premises, from Monday.
“About
900 kilograms of garbage is generated at the airport here daily. More
than 85 per cent of it comes from 25 domestic and two international
flights that land here every day. The rest is the waste produced by
eateries, etc at the airport,” says Airport Director G. Prakash Reddy.
The
waste is in huge volumes and comprises mostly of plastic bottles,
cartons and carry bags, besides food waste. It is all dumped in an open
yard close to the cargo section. Corporation trucks collect the garbage
from there once a day in the morning or afternoon.
As
it is just once a day, the garbage is accessible to stray animals,
vermin and birds that scatter the litter across the nearby areas. This
attracts the bigger birds posing a danger of bird hits.
“We realised that stopping the food chain would put an end to entry of stray animals to the airport,” adds the airport director.
The
initiative was inaugurated by the Corporation Commissioner K.
Vijayakarthikeyan on Monday. Now, the airlines will collect the wastes
from the aircraft and deposit it into a kiosk near the terminal
building. Persons deployed by RAAC will collect the garbage twice a day
from the kiosk and take it to a segregation unit that has been lying
unused for eight months since it was established.
There, the waste will
be segregated into degradable, non-degradable, recyclable and
non-recyclable wastes.“They will segregate it from 9
a.m. to 11 a.m. and again from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. and sell the recyclable
materials to recycling units. Degradable and non-recyclable wastes will
be collected by the corporation. It will put an end to the garbage
menace without any expense to the airport,” says Terminal Manager Vanaja
Sole.
According to Mr. Prakash Reddy the Airport
Authority of India (AAI) is also planning to establish a biogas plant at
the airport later this year after studying the volume of degradable
wastes generated at the airport.
[Source]
