 Once pollution prevention practices are implemented

throughout the industrial process, a business will be

well on its way to achieving
environmental sustainability.
 Sustainability, as defined by the Brundtland
Commission in 1987, is “development that meets the
needs of the present without compromising the ability
of future generations to meet their own needs.”
 While cost savings and regulatory drivers are
important, environmental sustainability represents a
higher goal—one that should be strived for because
it's the right thing to do.
• The benefits of pollution prevention and environmental
sustainability improved working conditions for employees,
competitive advantages with environmental-savy clients and
consumers, and improved community and regulator relations.
• The Pollution Prevention Act establishes a national policy that
requires that
(i) pollution should be prevented or reduced at the source whenever
feasible,
(ii) pollution that cannot be prevented should be recycled in an
environmentally safe manner whenever feasible,
(iii) pollution that cannot be prevented or recycled should be treated
in an environmentally safe manner whenever feasible; and
(iv) disposal or other release into the environment should be
employed only as a last resort and should be conducted in an
environmentally safe manner.
• Waste minimisation is a set of processes and practices
intended to reduce the amount of waste produced.
• By reducing or eliminating the generation of harmful and
persistent wastes, waste minimisation supports efforts to
promote a more sustainable society.
• Waste minimisation involves redesigning products and
processes and/or changing societal patterns
of consumption and production.
• There are many types of waste: municipal
(household, commercial and demolition waste),
hazardous (industrial), biomedical, electronic (e-
waste), radioactive, etc.
• Waste management includes the collection, transport,
valorization and disposal of these waste.
• More broadly, it includes any activity involved in the
organization of waste management from production
to final treatment.
• The main principles of waste management are:
1.Waste hierarchy, referring to the “3Rs rule” Reduce,
Reuse and Recycle, waste prevention and minimisation
being the most desirable goal.
2.Extended producer responsibility, adding all the
environmental costs to the market price of a product,
including end-of-life disposal.
3.The polluter pays principle, requiring that a waste
generator pays for the appropriate disposal of the waste.
Waste management techniques include:
 Landfills
 Incineration
 Recycling
 Biological reprocessing
 Waste collection
 Energy recovery
Each type of waste corresponds to a management
process.
To properly manage waste, pre-sorting is necessary.
This sorting allows the separation of recyclable from
non-recyclable waste, and subsequently the energy
recovery.
ECONOMIC
• Waste management involves collecting, sorting, treating,
recycling, and when properly facilitated providing a
source of energy and resources.
• Therefore, it has a huge economic potential that needs to
be leveraged by public and private entities.
SOCIAL
• Besides creating jobs, improved waste management
leads to a better quality of life for local populations, by
improving hygiene conditions and reducing health risks
related to illegal dumping and inadequate garbage
collection.
ENVIRONMENTAL
• The main advantage of sustainable waste management is
to lessen the impact on the environment, by improving
air and water quality and contributing to the reduction
of greenhouse gas emissions.
• Besides, reducing food waste also helps reduce the
heavy environmental cost of producing more.
 For developed country waste is not a problem that has
to be disposed somehow, but a good business.
 The companies involved in generating electricity from
waste run a multibillion-dollar profitable enterprise
with waste processing units spread across several cities
and localities
 They aggregates non-hazardous residential and
commercial waste and burns it in boilers (mass
incinerators) to recover valuable byproducts – steam,
electricity, metals, aluminium, glass and fly ash.
 The facility makes good money, but it wants to extract
more from its plant and machinery and that is where AI
comes into play.
 This waste, also referred to as municipal solid waste
(MSW), is a mixture of energy-rich materials such as
food waste, packaging pallets, plastics, paper, coir,
cardboards, plywood and packaging materials.
 Just like coal in a thermal power plant, these can be
burnt to produce electricity.
 Because of the nature of burning waste to recover
energy, these plants are referred to as waste-to-energy
plants.
 Waste-to-energy is a technologically advanced means of
waste disposal that is widely recognised for reducing
greenhouse gases – particularly methane – by eliminating
emissions from landfills.

 Methane that emanates from dumped garbage as in open

landfills, is a greenhouse gas and is 84 times more potent
as a climate-warming gas than CO2.
 The collected waste is aggregated and hauled into a waste
processing plant.
 The waste is burnt in a boiler to release heat energy.
 Heat is used to turn water into steam in the boiler.
 The steam is fed to a turbine-generator unit to produce electricity.
 Gas cleaning systems clean the gas from pollutants before being
released to the atmosphere.
 Metals and glass are recovered from the bottom ash (unburnt
material) of the boiler.
 These are sold as recycle scrap to metal and glass industries.
 The collected ash can be used to make bricks, road-fill material or
disposed to landfills.
 In a submission to the UNFCCC outlining its expectations
from the Global Stocktake, India emphasised that the outcome
should encourage developed nations to reduce their emissions
in alignment with their historical responsibilities and provide
support to developing countries in terms of finance,
technology development and transfer, and capacity
building.
 Global Stocktake is a two-year UN review to evaluate
collective global progress towards achieving the goals of the
Paris Agreement. This process will conclude at the end of
COP28 in Dubai.
 The Global Stocktake outcome must promote global
climate action within the context of poverty
eradication, sustainable development, economic
diversification efforts, and closing gaps in social and
economic development between developed and
developing countries.
 India has said that the first-ever Global Stocktake
outcome should prioritise addressing pre2020 gaps,
capture equity as an overarching concern and
acknowledge the serious lack of ambition among
developed nations in combating climate change
 Water and energy are interlinked.
 By saving water we save energy and by saving energy we
save water.
 Water from which energy is taken also uses the same
energy in various ways when it gets transported or treated
for other purposes.
 By decreasing the need to treat and distribution of water
and the waste water it is possible to conserve water and
energy.
 By not wasting the hot water that is supplied to the
houses offer a big saving in the process.
 This not only saves water but also the electricity bills of
the house owners and the electricity wastage.
 On the whole if we take globally almost 70% of available
fresh water is getting used for agriculture.
 The water each individual typically uses per day is not
even 10%. Rest is used by the industries.
 The water that gets supplied to agriculture cannot be
charged.
 Necessary actions and researches have to be taken seriously
to conserve water and energy.
 The demand for water is increasing and the energy too is
increasing rapidly.
• To meet out the demands beneficial plans have to be
adopted as soon as possible.
Conserving water conserves energy. We can save water in many
processes at home. They can be
 Fitting a low flow level shower head. An energy-efficient shower
head that uses less energy.
 Conventional western toilets use large quantity of water. By
adopting low-flush toilets and composting toilets water usage can
be minimized.
 Dual flush toilets. This has two different levels of flush and these
toilets use up to 67% less water than the conventional type.
 Saline or sea water can also be used for flushing toilets.

 Fitting faucet aerator can also prevent water being wasted. They
break the flow of water into fine droplets to maintain wetting
effectiveness at the same time uses less water.
 Waste water reusing or recycling water. Reusing the water for
toilets and watering the lawns.
 Rainwater harvesting can help a lot in increasing the water
level.
 High efficiency cloth washing machines that use less water.
 Irrigation methods that adopt the climatic conditions.
 Leakage prevention
 Covering the swimming pools so that water loss due to
evaporation can be prevented. It can also warm the pool so
that the energy needed to heat up is also reduced.
 Automatic faucet that prevents the water loss due to open
taps. It automates the use of the faucets without the use of
hands.
• Saving energy in turn also saves water. It’s much related. So here
are some of the ways in which we can save energy.
• Turning off the lights and other electrical appliance when not in
use.
• Unplug the electrical appliances when they are not used as
plugged TV, DVD player and mobile charges consume energy
even when plugged in.
• Washing the clothes in cold water so that the energy consumed
for heating water is saved.
• Fix compact fluorescent light bulbs in lamps as they use ¼ of the
power of normal bulbs.
• Turn off the monitors when not in use.
• Put on washing machines only when you full load.
• A flickering light consumes more energy than a normal one so
always have a check to avoid
 Renewable refer to any form of energy that’s not finite – so
everything from wind and solar to biomass.
 The transition towards renewable such as solar and wind energy
is critical part of meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement,
which aims to limit the rise of global average temperatures to
well below 2 degrees Celsius, and ideally below 1.5 degrees
Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
 Solar energy is the most abundant
clean energy source on the planet.
 It’s produced by nuclear fusion that takes place in the sun
– which occurs when protons of hydrogen atoms collide
in the sun’s core and create a helium atom.
 Solar panels capture this energy from the sun, and then
either convert solar into power or heat water (solar
thermal).
 And while solar farms can take up a lot of land, most
solar technology is now located on rooftops, and
increasingly in windows.


 It is one of the cleanest, and cheapest sources of energy

available to us, with the International Energy Agency
(IEA) declaring that some solar power schemes offer
“the cheapest electricity in history.”
 Wind energy is the most competitively priced renewable
technology in many markets, and its relatively low
operating costs have seen the number of wind turbines
increase globally in recent years.
 Wind turbines work when wind turns the blades of a
turbine around a rotor, which in turn spins a generator,
which creates electricity.
 There are two types of wind farms: onshore and offshore.
 Offshore wind farms have
the advantage of frequent windy
conditions;
• Water is one of the oldest sources of energy, having been
used for more than 2,000 years to power water mills,
while hydropower has been used to generate electricity
since the late 19th century.
• Usually built inside dams, hydroelectric power plants
push stored water through giant turbines to generate
electricity.
• Hydropower will account for 16% of global electricity
demand by 2023, according to the IEA , and so the sector
plays a vital role in the implementation of the Paris
Agreement.
• The development of hydropower, however, does not
come without environmental and social costs.
 Deforestation, marine life impacts and the displacement
of local populations can be among its negative
consequences, brought about especially by large-scale
projects.
 The effects of climate change also have an impact on the
power production; for example, between 2014 and 2017
in Brazil, an unprecedented drought reduced water
pressure in hydroelectric plants, resulting in higher water
consumption tariffs.
 The contribution of the hydropower sector to the goals
of the Paris Agreement, therefore, needs to be considered
not only in terms of avoiding greenhouse gas emissions,
but also in promoting projects that ensure that the impact
of large projects is minimized.
 Bioenergy is a type of energy generated when we burn
biomass fuel.
 There are four types of biomass that can be made into
biomass fuel:
 Wood residue (such as low-value tree parts sourced
from forests during felling);
Farm waste (such as manure, straw and food
production leftovers);
 Energy crops (such as wheat, oilseed, silage); and
organic waste (such as food waste and used cooking
oil).
 The International Energy Agency referred to modern
bioenergy as the “overlooked giant” of renewable
energy, with it responsible for half of all renewable
energy consumed in 2017.
It is not without its issues – biomass energy still
produces emissions, in particular methane from animal
waste, and the use of wood in biomass power plants can
be a contributing factor to deforestation.
 Also, “first-generation” biofuels produced ethanol from
food sources such as sugarcane and corn, which led to
increased food prices.
We are now see “fourth-generation biofuels”, which
avoid this problem by using genetically modified algae to
enhance biofuel production.
• This type of energy takes the heat from geothermal
reservoirs beneath the surface of the earth and converts it
to energy.
• It has been used for bathing and heating for centuries, but
is now used for electricity generation.
• One example of this is in Iceland, which sources 80% of
its energy requirements from geothermal and
hydroelectric power.
• It works in a relatively simple way, pumping the heat
present just under the surface of the Earth, which heats
buildings in the winter and then extracts the heat from
buildings in the summer, and transfers it back
underground.
• The benefits of this type of energy are myriad:
geothermal fields produce practically no emissions, it is
consistent, and geothermal heat pump systems use 25-
50% less electricity than conventional heating systems.
• Shallow geothermal fields are fairly common and are
today being used in about 90 countries, and it used in
multiple cities for heating, such as in Paris, where for
example, the Radio France building is run on shallow
geothermal energy.
• Marine, or ocean energy refers to all types of energy that
can be harnessed from the sea, such as from waves, tidal
streams, ocean currents, ocean thermal and tidal ranges.
• This is done by exploiting the power of waves and tides,
as well as differences in sea temperatures and salinity.
• This type of energy is of course very abundant, with 71%
of the planet covered by oceans, however most of the
technology around it is still in its infancy.
• The projects that do exist use technology such as wave
power converters, tidal turbines, ocean current
turbines and ocean thermal energy converters.
• While this infrastructure does effect underwater wildlife,
the potential of marine energy is huge, and it’s a sector
that is set to grow in the coming decades.
Major issues in the audit of pollution
 Data about sources and extent of pollution.
 Recognition of threats to health and environment posed by
pollution.
 Existence of policy/ laws/rules for the control of pollution.
 Existence and adherence to quality criteria.
 Penalties for violation of quality criteria.

 Programs /strategies to reduce pollution.

 Compliance to programs /strategies to reduce pollution.

 Monitoring of compliance to programs /strategies to reduce

pollution.
 Adequacy of infrastructure to control pollution.
Waste Management
• Because we have many waste outcomes other than household
wastes, such as industrial, pharmaceutical, chemical,
manufacturing units, and food processing machines, it is
necessary to take some measures in terms of proper disposal –
improper disposal of these wastes resulting in environmental
pollution.
• As a result, caution must be exercised when disposing of these
wastes in order to limit contamination levels in our environment.
 Management of industrial waste: They should also be
categorised into biodegradable and non-biodegradable
categories.
 Before disposing of them, we can render them harmless.

 The following are some of the strategies used to handle

industrial waste:
• Reduce – to reduce the use of Natural Resources.
• Reuse – to use the article again and again.

• Recycle – to process the waste and make it reusable.

Using less fossil fuel is one technique to reduce pollution in the
air. The following are some of the pollution management
measures to follow in order to reduce air pollution:
 Whenever possible, choose to walk or ride a bike instead of
driving.
 Instead of driving your own or business vehicle, use public
transportation.
 Replace incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent bulbs or
LEDs to save electricity.
 More trees should be planted! Because trees filter the air by
taking in carbon dioxide and releasing oxygen.
 Reduce immersion of greenhouse gases like Carbon Dioxide,
methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, sulfur hexafluoride,
dichlorodifluoromethane etc.
Environmental pollution is a huge global concern because of
the negative consequences it has on people’s health and the
environment. Some of the techniques that should be used to
reduce pollution in the environment include:
 Garbage should not be disposed of over an open fire.
 Use eco-friendly or biodegradable products instead of plastic
because plastic-like products are highly harmful in nature.
 Maintain proper trash disposal, particularly for dangerous
wastes, and devise waste reduction methods.
 Stop smoking in public places, or at the very least adhere to
“No Smoking” restrictions.
 Do not trash in public areas, and anti-litter initiatives should
be implemented to educate the people.
 Don’t make any loud or bothersome noises.
• The proper disposal of treatment plant effluent or reuse
requirements is an essential part of planning and designing
wastewater treatment facilities.
• Different methods of ultimate disposal of secondary
effluents are as follows.
1. Natural Evaporation
• The process involves large impoundments with no
discharge.
• Depending on the climatic conditions large impoundments
may be necessary if precipitation exceeds evaporation.
• Therefore, considerations must be given to net evaporation,
storage requirements, and possible percolation and
groundwater pollution.
• This method is particularly beneficial where recovery of
residues is desirable such as for disposal of brines.
2.Groundwater Recharge
• Methods for groundwater recharge include rapid
infiltration by effluent application or impoundment,
intermittent percolation, and direct injection.
• In all cases risks for groundwater pollution exists.
• Furthermore, direct injection implies high costs of
treating effluent and injection facilities.
3. Irrigation
• Irrigation has been practiced primarily as a substitute for
scarce natural waters or sparse rainfall in arid areas.
• In most cases food chain crops (i.e. crops consumed by
humans and those animals whose products are
consumed by humans) may not be irrigated by effluent.
• However, field crops such as cotton, sugar beets, and
crops for seed production are grown with wastewater
effluent.
• Wastewater effluent has been used for watering parks,
golf courses and highway medians.
4. Recreational Lakes
• The effluent from the secondary treatment facility is
stored in a lagoon for approximately 30 days.
• The effluent from the lagoon is chlorinated and then
percolated through an area of sand and gravel, through
which it travels for approximately 0.5 km and is
collected in an interceptor trench.
• It is discharged into a series of lakes used for
swimming, boating and fishing.
5. Aquaculture
• Aquaculture, or the production of aquatic organisms
(both flora and fauna), has been practiced for centuries
primarily for production of food, fiber and fertilizer.
• Lagoons are used for aquaculture, although artificial
and natural wetlands are also being considered.
• However, the uncontrolled spread of water hyacinths is
itself a great concern because the flora can clog
waterways and ruin water bodies.
6.Municipal Uses
 Technology is now available to treat wastewater to the
extent that it will meet drinking water quality standards.
 However, direct reuse of treated wastewater is
practicable only on an emergency basis.
 Many natural bodies of water that are used for
municipal water supply are also used for effluent
disposal which is done to supplement the natural water
resources by reusing the effluent many times before it
finally flows to the sea.
7. Industrial Uses
• Effluent has been successfully used as a cooling water
or boiler feed water.
• Deciding factors for effluent reuse by the industry
include
(1) availability of natural water,
(2) quality and quantity of effluent, and cost of
processing,
(3) pumping and transport cost of effluent, and
(4) industrial process water that does not involve
public health considerations.
8. Discharge into Natural Waters
• Discharge into natural waters is the most common
disposal practice.
• The self-purification or assimilative capacity of natural
waters is thus utilized to provide the remaining
treatment.
• Garbage arising from human or animal activities, that is
abandoned as unwanted and useless is referred as solid
waste.
• Generally, it is generated from industrial, residential and
commercial activities in a given area, and may be handled
in a variety of ways.
• However, waste can be categorized based on materials
such as paper, plastic, glass, metal and organic waste.
• Solid waste disposal must be managed systematically to ensure
environmental best practices.
• Solid waste disposal and management is a critical aspect of
environmental hygiene and it needs to be incorporated into
environmental planning.
• Solid waste disposal and management includes planning,
administrative, financial, engineering and legal functions.
• Bins:
• Blue: dry waste, recyclable
• Green: wet waste
• Red: not bio degradable
• In most emergency situations the main sources of solid
waste are:
 Medical centres
 Food stores
 Feeding centres
 Food distribution points
 Slaughter areas
 Warehouses
 Agency premises
 Markets
 Domestic areas
 Different categories of solid waste include:
Organic waste: Waste from preparation of food,
market places, etc.
 Combustibles: Paper, wood, dried leaves,
packaging for relief items, etc.
(high organic and low moisture
content)
 Non-combustibles: Metal, tin cans, bottles, stones, etc.
 Ashes/dust: Residue from fires used for
cooking
 Bulky waste: Tree branches, tyres, etc.
 Dead animals: Carcasses of domestic animals
and livestock
 Hazardous waste: Oil, battery acid, medical waste
 Construction waste: Roofing, rubble, broken concrete, etc.
• Initial steps in solid waste management
 Key components of solid waste management Solid
waste management can be divided into five key
components:
 Generation
 Storage
 Collection
 Transportation
 Disposal
• Methods of solid waste disposal and management
are as below:
 Open burning
 Dumping into the sea
 Sanitary Landfills
 Incineration
 Composting
 Ploughing in fields
 Hog feeding
 Grinding and discharging into sewers
 Salvaging
 Fermentation and biological digestion
Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Open Burning
• Not an ideal method in the present day context
Dumping into Sea
• Possible only in coastal cities
• Refuse shall be taken in barges sufficiently far away
from the coast (15-30 km) and dumped there
• Very costly
• Not environment friendly
Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Sanitary Landfilling of Solid Wastes:

• Simple, cheap, and effective
• A deep trench (3 to 5 m) is excavated
• Refuse is laid in layers
• Layers are compacted with some mechanical equipment
and covered with earth, leveled, and compacted
• With time, the fill would settle
• Microorganisms act on the organic matter and degrade
them
Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Sanitary Landfilling of Solid Wastes:

• Decomposition is similar to that in composting.
• Facultative bacteria hydrolyze complex organic matter
into simpler water soluble organics
• These diffuse through the soil where fungi and other
bacteria convert them to carbon dioxide and water under
aerobic conditions
• Too much refuse shall not be buried – fire hazard
• Moisture content – not less than 60% for good
biodegradation
 Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Engineered Landfills of Solid Wastes

 Bottom of the trench is lined with impervious material to
prevent the leachate from contaminating groundwater
 A well designed and laid out leachate collection mechanism is
to be provided
 Leachate so collected is treated and then disposed off

Fig;A Typical
Sanitary Landfill
for Solid Waste
 Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management
Incineration of Solid Waste
• A method suited for combustible refuse
• Refuse is burnt
• Suited in crowded cities where sites for land filling are not
available
• High construction and operation costs
• Sometimes used to reduce the volume of solid wastes for land
filling
• Primary chamber – designed to facilitate rapid desiccation of
moist refuse and complete combustion of refuse and volatile
gases
• A ledge or drying hearth is provided for this purpose
• Secondary chamber – between the primary chamber and the
stack – temperatures above 700 degree C
• All unburnt and semi burnt material are completely burnt here
 Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Composting
 Similar to sanitary landfilling
 Yields a stable end product – good soil conditioner and
may be used as a base for fertilizers
 Popular in developing countries
 Decomposable organic matter is separated and
composted

Methods
 Open window composting
 Mechanical composting
Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Disposal by Ploughing into fields

 Not very commonly used
 Not environment friendly in general
Disposal by hog feeding
 Not common in India
 Refuse is ground well in grinders and then fed into
sewers
 Disposal of garbage into sewers – BOD and TSS
increases by 20-30%
 Disposal of residual refuse – still a problem
Methods of Solid Waste Disposal and Management

Salvaging
 Materials like paper, metal, glass, rags, certain types of
plastic etc. can be salvaged, recycled, and reused
Fermentation or Biological Digestion
 Biodegradable Waste – convert to compost
 Recycle whatever is possible
 Hazardous wastes – dispose it by suitable methods
 Landfill or incinerate the rest
Town Planning
 Green city is defined as “a city that promotes energy
efficiency and renewable energy in all its activities,
extensively promotes green solutions, applies land
compactness with mixed land use and social mix practices
in its planning systems, and anchors its local development
in the principles of green growth and equity.”
 Unlike other definitions for green cities, the above
definition distinctively includes energy efficiency as a key
feature.
 Furthermore, it was proven that GDP has a positive
influence on Green City performance, population size has
a negative impact, and that the most influential factors are
sanitation and air quality.
 Greenbelt means planting of special type of plants suitable to that
particular agroclimate zone and soil characteristics in a place
which will make the area cooler, reduce air pollution, prevent soil
erosion and further improve the soil fertility status.
 A green belt around the periphery of boundary and road side will
be created to avoid erosion of soil, prevention of landslides,
minimize the air pollution and noise pollution in the project area.
The green plants are capable of absorbing air pollutants and
forming sinks for pollutants.
 Leaves with their vast area in a tree crown, absorb pollutants on
their surface, effectively reducing their concentration and noise
level in the ambient.