HYDERABAD: After banning usage of paper cups, single-use plastic water bottles, using a bio-digester to grow over 15, 000 trees, Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad (IIT-H) has now set up a comprehensive waste management system on its campus at Kandi in Sangareddy district.
In the last two years, the institute has significantly reduced its carbon footprint by initiatives such as door-to-door waste collection, replacing RO water purifiers with UV water purifiers among others.
“The culture of a clean campus will not only make IIT Hyderabad a better place to live, but when students leave the campus, this culture will develop wherever they go....it is our duty towards nature, to keep it intact for the future generation. Resource Recovery Park (RRP) is one such small step in this direction”, IIT Hyderabad director BS Murty said, on the facility commissioned recently.
Murty said the campus already has a functional sewage treatment plant based on membrane bioreactor technology. The solid waste generated on the campus was separated into dry and wet categories. Wet waste, generated in hostel mess, is shredded and fed into a biogas digester. The generated biogas is used in the students’ dining facility to reduce the consumption of fossil fuels. The wet waste from the residential areas is sent to the vermicompost facility at the RRP. The compost is used for gardening purposes.
Likewise, all biodegradable wastes were moved to the pits/windrow platform for composting. The institute process biodegradable wastes using microbial and vermicomposting techniques. Once processed, the compost is passed through a sieving machine to remove foreign particles and bigger chunks of waste. The compost is then stored in the compost storage room and later used as fertiliser, the institute said in a statement.
