Presentation from the 2nd CPR-NITI Aayog Seminar on Zero Waste

1. NitiAayog–CentreForPolicyResearchOpenSeminar Series
“Conceptualising Zero-Waste in India under Swachh Bharat:
Possibilities & Challenges”
Monday,29th June 2015,15:00–16:30 hrs
Room 122 Niti Aayog,Sansad Marg,New Delhi 110001

2. Date: 29.06.2015
Pathways to Zero Waste in India
Ashish Chaturvedi
Research Fellow
Green Transformations Cluster and ESRC STEPS Centre

3. Global Material Consumption per Capita: range 1.5 to >50 t
19.1
8.5
4.6
2.8
1.1
1.1
Domestic Material Consumption (DMC) per capita, 2008
very low: < 5 t /cap
low: 5 - 9 t /cap
average: 9 - 13 t /cap
high: 13 - 20 t /cap
very high: 21 - 30 t /cap
extremly high: > 30 t /cap
1,9 3,1
4,0
4,1
11,0
12,5
14,3
14,4
14,5
14,1
21,8
42,3
51,3
28,1
16,5
14,3
7,0
7,1
10,2
10,3
7,9
16,6
5,7
19,0
10,4

4. Domestic Material Consumption
Source: http://www.unep.org

5. Where will resources come from in the
future?
Keep digging deeper and further on the planet
Start rethinking about current consumption and
production patterns
Transformation: From a Throw-Away to a Circular
Economy

6. A circular economy is an
alternative to a traditional
linear economy (make, use,
dispose) in which we keep
resources in use for as long
as possible, extract the
maximum value from them
whilst in use, then recover
and regenerate products and
materials at the end of each
service life.
Source: http://www.wrap.org.uk/content/wrap-and-circular-economy

7. Circular Economy/ Zero Waste
In open systems, it is impossible to close loops within a
ward, city, state, country.
– Loops are generally closed across borders
What do we talk about when we talk about Zero Waste?
– Waste minimization within a geography (village, city etc)
– Is that the most efficient solution?
Zero waste might need to explicitly understand urban-peri-
urban-rural linkages
– Biological nutrients entering and leaving a city

8. Circular Economy Gaining Traction
Germany and Japan – manufacturing giants have
extensive laws on the promotion of a circular
economy.
China announced a Law in 2008, established a high
level Circular Economy Institute in 2013.
In India – lots of initiatives, two recent agreements
between the MoEFCC with the EU and Germany to
set up working groups for Circular Economy.

9. What is happening in China?

10. What is happening in China?

11. Lessons from China
Waste profile is similar
Private Sector is similar; local implementation
capacities are similarly constrained
Scale is different
Solutions would have to be adapted to our context

12. What is happening in the EU?

13. Lessons from the EU?
Our waste is different – calorific value of residual waste is
almost half of that in EU
Our capacities are different – levels of finance and number of
staff.
Our private sector involved in waste management is different
Our knowledge attitudes and practices towards waste are
different
Off the shelf solutions from the EU not relevant for the Indian
context

14. Another Dimension in India (and China)
Waste Management provides jobs to 1-2% of the
urban population in the informal sector
Organized and efficient collection, segregation and
material extraction
Do not always adhere to environmental/
occupational health and safety standards

15. Pathway 1: Techno-Nirvana
Attitudes to waste Waste management process Key issues
Focus is on recovering the
maximum value from the
waste through large scale and
capital intensive technology
Local government collaborates with formal private sector
to recover value out of waste and introduces technology-
based interventions for resource management.
Contractual agreements, (through public private
partnerships), are for whole waste value chain.
Households segregate waste at source into multiple
categories. Door to door collection organized by formal
private sector through motorized pick-up vehicles.
Large centralized material recovery facilities segregate
recyclables and compost organic fractions of waste.
Non-recyclable and inorganic fractions sent for energy
recovery in large capital intensive incinerators
Informal re-use and repair industry
suffers because extended producer
responsibility is interpreted to extend
producer property rights to entire product
life cycle.
Waste management infrastructure highly
capital intensive, large-scale,
mechanised, as well as carbon and
energy intensive
Cost passed on by local government to
waste generators – households,
commercial establishments, and non-
commercial organisations.
Additional increased costs for pollution
control and monitoring the infrastructure
Financial intermediaries support
innovative entrepreneurs or large waste
management companies to set up waste
management infrastructure.
Potential conflict between environmental
groups and local government,
inexperienced in the consequences of
large infrastructure

16. Pathway 2: Green Transformations
Attitudes to waste Waste management process Consequences Key issues
Focus on inclusive
resource management
Local government
values resource-saving
potential of skills,
networks and
decentralized
infrastructure as well as
potential for job
creation which results
from this partnership
with informal sector
collective.
Waste segregated at source by generators
(households, commerce, etc) with door to
door collection managed by an informal
sector collective.
Collections monitored and material is
transferred to decentralized material sorting
facilities, also managed by the collective in
partnership with NGOs and technology
start-ups.
Local government pays waste pickers,
operates state-of-the-art landfills, and
actively encourages repair and
refurbishment markets through incentives
like providing space for weekly markets
selling second-hand and repaired goods.
Financial and regulatory instruments make
landfilling of recyclables and energy-rich
materials prohibitively expensive for the
waste disposer.
Repair and re-use industry actively
promoted and works in close partnership
with product manufacturers
Manufacturers work with informal
collectives setting up take back
programmes for end of life
products, making them a crucial
link in their value chains
Local government can enforce
environmentally sound and
occupational health and safety
compliant processes. Process is
facilitated by simplified regimes of
taxation to informal sector
enterprises who are members of
the collective.
Incinerators not considered viable
for developing country context
Other Waste to Energy technologies
– Biomethanation - possible.
Minimal conflict between formal and
informal sectors since the former
benefits from the latter’s
participation in the value chain.
However, such participation needs
active intervention from local
government and other policy
enablers to ensure materials do not
leak back into unregulated markets.

17. Implications for Design and Implementation
of Swachch Bharat
Local Government
Source segregation is critical
– Not segregated, not collected
Create decentralized material recovery facilities and compost facilities
Develop predictable/ consistent approaches - important for private sector (both
formal and informal) participation
Engage with a broader set of stakeholders for technology appraisal
Explore co-incineration of (currently) non-recyclable waste in cement kilns as a
climate friendly option for waste management

18. Implications for Design and Implementation
of Swachch Bharat
Central Government
Inter-ministerial coordination for Transformation to a Circular Economy
A National Level Panel for developing a Road Map for the efficient management of
Secondary Raw Materials
Infrastructure investments in Swachch Bharat directed towards low-carbon
technologies
Initiate dialogue with Manufacturers whose products lead to waste
– Elimination of hazardous substances
– Elimination of non-recyclable packaging
Create a platform for dialogue over waste incineration
– Unpack Waste to Energy – Waste to Energy ≠ Incineration
– Incineration is a technology of yesterday
– Discourages higher order processes in the WM hierarchy

19. Questions/ Comments
A.Chaturvedi@ids.ac.uk
Ashish.Chaturvedi@outlook.com