Sindh cabinet approves policy to generate energy from Karachi municipal waste
Waste-to-energy plants to be installed in other cities of the province
Karachi: The Sindh cabinet on Thursday approved its policy on using Karachi’s municipal waste for renewable energy generation.
The Sindh cabinet, which met with Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah in the chair, approved the draft of the Sindh Waste-to-Energy Policy-2021.
Sindh Energy Minister, Imtiaz Ahmed Shaikh, while presenting the draft policy before the cabinet for approval, said that Karachi’s 20 million population generated around 0.59 kilograms per capita trash daily.
He said that Karachi had two landfill sites for proper disposal of the municipal waste - Jam Chakro and Gond Pass - both spread over 500 acres each.
He said another landfill site having an area of 3,000 acres would be constructed in Dhabeji area near Karachi. The cabinet was briefed that Karachi generated over 10,000 tonnes of municipal waste daily. Sukkur in Sindh generates 400 tonnes of waste while Larkana generates 325 tonnes of trash daily.
The newly approved policy envisages that in the first phase Karachi will experiment with generating renewable energy from municipal waste. In the next phase, the waste-to-energy plants will be installed in other cities of the province.
Karachi alone is capable of producing over 200 megawatts of renewable electricity on the basis of its municipal waste.
The proposed waste-to-energy plant will be installed at the Jam Chakro landfill site of the city as renewable electricity to be generated by the unit could easily be supplied to the Karachi’s power utility whose grid station is also present nearby.
The meeting was informed that certain credible energy sector companies had contacted the government to install a waste-to-energy plant at the Jam Chakro’s site that would be capable of producing up to 50MW renewable energy.
Sindh Energy Minister said the waste-to-energy project was being planned with the vision to use the most effective and safest way to get rid of municipal waste in Karachi. He said the waste-to-energy project was aimed at disposal and consumption of the trash in the most environment friendly manner.
He said the waste-to-energy renewable projects in Sindh would be like an invaluable addition to the sustainable efforts being made to overcome the electricity shortfall persisting in the country.