DELAYED DISPOSAL OF PLASTICS

It has been noticed that delay in the disposal of plastic wastes is an important feature of plastics wastes in India. This delay at the consumers' end is in contrast to the behaviour of their counterpart in advanced countries. This is due to the tendency of the people not to reject the shopping bags, milk pouches, mineral water bottles etc. upon first use, unless it is made of poor quality recycled plastics waste (this is reflected in its appearance and dirty colour). Their secondary/tertiary use continues to flourish unless bag/packaging material becomes completely unserviceable. So is the case with used plastics containers and even partially - broken plastics, moulded consumer articles, like buckets, baskets, jerry cans and the like. Here again the ingenuity of a few individuals has brought to the scene, the so-called 'Plastic-mechanics". These mechanics visit various residential localities on weekdays and offer their services to repair on the spot, broken plastics articles by the simple process of 'fusion'. While this culture enables enhancing the economic utility of the commodity, it also results in delaying the disposal of plastics. So successful is the style of delayed disposal of a household 'plastics article' that a plastics mechanic claims to earn on an average Rs.75/- per day. In that sense, waste minimization, reuse and materials recycling concepts are being practiced in India.

So we have a situation, wherein a major portion, accounting for 60-80 per cent of India's plastics waste, is collected and segregated to be recycled back for further processing into items for the consumer. The balance unutilized waste remains uncollected, strewn on the ground, littered around in open drains or in unmanaged garbage dumps. The collection of such solid waste including the one recycled three, or even four times earlier, is not only uneconomical for recovery of material, but also unhygienic and undermines the environmental benefits of materials recycling. Hence, these indiscriminately disposed solid plastics wastes are of concern in view of causing chokage of municipal sewers and blocking of storm water run-off particularly in hilly areas besides aesthesis nuisance.

Such unclaimed plastics wastes together with Municipal Solid Waste, when incinerated can provide an economical source of energy with desired calorific value. Technology based systems of incineration, the contributions of plastics waste in general and dirty plastics waste in particular together with MSW for recovery of heat energy is encouraged the world over. In fact plastics wastes can be a fuel for the future. It is estimated that plastics waste is a fuel that can be burnt to produce nearly 10 per cent of Europe's domestic electricity and heating, and replace over half of the coal imports of Western Europe. Similar technology developments in India need to be explored in the near future for better and cleaner management of plastics waste.