Policy on using urban garbage for road construction coming soon

10 Oct 2023 CW Team

A national policy to hand over urban trash to the road construction agencies in a systematic manner and engineer garbage disposal is about to be introduced by the Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH), buoyed by its successful pilot programme usage of segregated solid waste retrieved from sanitary landfill sites for construction of highways.

In addition to reducing environmental pollution and safeguarding public health, the initiative seeks to reclaim 10 hectares of land across states that have become unusable. Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways, said that after consulting with stakeholders, other ministries, and state-level municipal organisations, mechanisms had already been decided upon.

"The policy is nearly complete. We will employ garbage from segregation?the removal of plastic, glass, and metals?for road construction. In certain sites, we are unable to extract soil due to environmental concerns, and in other spots, where soil stabilisation is being done, we are encountering difficulty with aggregates (gravel, crushed stone, and sand). The use of rubbish waste will have many advantages. Ten hectares of garbage are harming the ecosystem, according to Gadkari, who was briefed about the plan.

The ministry had built roads under the Dholera project in Ahmedabad, the first section of the Delhi-Mumbai Motorway, and Urban Extension Road II, which connects NH 44 with the Delhi-Gurgaon Motorway on NH 48 in Delhi, using inert material made from municipal solid waste on an experimental basis.

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