Bhubaneswar: Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC) on Tuesday decided to take up the second phase of bio-mining of 9 lakh metric tonnes of legacy waste dumped at Bhuasuni in three phases.This will take the city’s total legacy waste processed through bio-mining to 21 lakh metric tonnes as, in the past three years, 12 lakh metric tonnes have been cleared. Bio-mining of waste helps segregate different types of waste and process them.“An agency is currently engaged since 2023 to process the legacy waste through bio-mining. Its agreement will lapse in October, by when it would have processed a little over 12 lakh metric tonnes. We have started the process for the second phase from now. Soon after the old agency leaves, the second phase work will begin in three stages,” said BMC additional commissioner (sanitation) Kailash Chandra Dash.The BMC was duping municipal solid waste at the site from 2008 to the end of 2022. After National Green Tribunal asked state govt to direct urban local bodies to stop open dumping of waste and bio-mine old (legacy) waste, BMC started the operation in 2023, officials said.As bio-mining of legacy waste at Bhuasuni has started, no fresh waste is being dumped at Daruthenga. The BMC promised the villagers that after stopping waste transportation it will bio-mine the old waste.“Bio-mining helps reclaim the land and also fill the void (crater) that was created to dump waste. It is a long process. The waste piled up will be segregated and processed,” a BMC engineer overseeing bio-mining operations said.In Nov 2021, the bio-mining plan received cabinet approval but the work couldn’t progress because of protest from the villagers as BMC, according to them, can’t start bio-mining till waste dumping was stopped.“The second phase of bio-mine operations will take at least two years. We are trying to ensure that the private party which gets the contract will take steps to check stinking of waste while extracting for processing,” an engineer said.
