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If you have been to Ras Al Khaimah lately, you might have noticed indications of an environmental transformation taking place; quietly, steadily, without much fanfare and publicity. You will see that green coloured garbage collection bins appear beside the old blue ones, in places where there were only the blue; and smaller litter
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bins in a bright red clinging to posts in various locations. You may be handed a flyer that tells you in Arabic, Malayalam and English to use the green container for paper, cardboard, plastic bottles, glass and cans; and the blue ones for food waste, film plastic, dirt and other trash. It will also caution you about the penalties for littering and provide you a hotline service telephone number for prompt replacement of containers that are full and overflowing.
You will surely encounter garbage collection trucks inscribed ‘Emirates Waste’ winding their way through the streets, stopping at hotels, restaurants, super markets, shopping malls, hospitals…. collecting rubbish. And regularly come across notices of, say, a seminar in a college, a painting competition in a school, or a practical workshop somewhere else – all environment-related.
What you are not likely to catch a glimpse of, however, is where all this is heading; because these destinations are way outside the settlement area. They are – a ‘materials recovery facility’ (MRF, for sorting, grading and processing recyclable materials), a compost facility (for converting organic waste into manure), and a state-of-the-art landfill (for burying the remaining waste in a safe manner), the only one of its kind in the UAE and the region. These are constituents of Ras Al Khaimah (RAK) government’s integrated waste management project (IWDP); one that integrates regulatory, monitoring and compliance functions with emission controls, waste collection and safe disposal.
The IWDP is changing a situation that looks like this: A total of 1700 cubic metres of waste, of which 20 per cent comprises recyclables, is placed in open roadside bins and transported in trucks to a dump on a daily basis. Littering is rampant, whether it is in a busy market place or throwaways from cars on highways. The cleaning staff has to work round the clock to keep a semblance of tidiness. Public awareness about environmental matters is almost non-existent; there have been no waste reduction measures, no proper waste management, hardly any regulations and, therefore, no question of compliance and enforcement.
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To this has come the IWDP with its “get crackin’ ” approach; serious, target driven, systematic, practical, and using the best technology available globally. Earthsense meets the visionary behind this revolutionary scheme, Sheikh Saud Bin Saqr Al Qasimi, Chief of the Ruler’s Court and Chairman of RAK Municipality and Public Works & Services Department. We also talk to some team members responsible for putting the entire operation in place and keeping it running – Michel Sakkal (technical manager, RAK Public Works & Services Department), Sayed E. Haque (director, overseas operations, Ceres Associates, a California-based company that is providing the technology and technical expertise), and Ali Mehr, principal engineer and chief design engineer for the RAK landfill, Ceres Associates).
The gist of the project is this: there is a concerted drive to reduce the quantity of waste going to the landfill by promoting and facilitating recycling. The first phase of the IWDP targets segregation of recyclables at source (that’s why the green, blue and red waste containers and the MRF) and making them marketable by enhancing their value – such as converting plastics into plastic granules, recovered paper into recycled paper and organic materials into natural organic fertiliser – for the international and domestic markets. Because of waste being recovered for recycling, that going to the landfill is expected to reduce by 25 per cent in the next 12 months, by 50 per cent in three years, and more as a garbage reduction programme (to reduce the quantity of waste produced in the first place) is implemented. In the long term, only the real wet waste ‘trashables’ are expected to make their way to RAK’s new landfill, which is lined to prevent any soil, water and air contamination and conforms to the United States Environment Protection Agency (US EPA) specifications. This replaces the old, unlined dump that is being closed.
The story doesn’t end there; it begins. What is perhaps most impressive is the immense importance being given to public education as practically the first step, targeting educational institutions and the general public; and employing mass media and direct mailing. Integrated waste management in a community starts from good environmental awareness, and Ceres Associates were keen to start it ASAP. This they are doing assisted by a team headed by Dr. Shaheed Khader.
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Sheikh Saud, farsighted, dynamic and progressive, shares with Earthsense his concerns about, and responses to, the environment.
We live in a finite world. But we can expand our resources by reusing those resources again and again. As we progress, we have more waste, and one way is to safely manage the waste that is part of society, part of living. So to meet the aspirations of the people, the aspirations of the leadership, and to be in line with other developed countries, we have tried to bring in the latest technology and have contracted a leading firm that has the highest professional capability in the business of environmental waste management. Our integrated waste management programme is the only one of its kind in the region.
In our region, people traditionally have had high levels of awareness about cleanliness and personal responsibility (towards it). We would like to reawaken this sense of responsibility.
It is vital for our region to catch up (with the developed world) in its waste management. It is not something that we can afford not to do. It is something that we must do today. If we manage it today, we save ourselves not turning our areas into wastelands. And we can actually save money over time. We would like to do such a thing for our country. And we want to spread the know-how to other emirates and other countries.
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Of course, the motivation has come from Sheikh Saud himself whose enthusiasm about environment education - in fact the IWDP project as a whole - is unmistakable as he speaks about it, personally explaining its nuances with the help of design drawings. The IWDP itself will be used as a public education tool, with visitor centres planned at the landfill and materials recovery facility, among the project’s other components. “The best management system is when everyone is involved. We want each stage of our waste management to be part of citizen’s awareness. If you make people aware of the consequences of their actions, they realise that they could have chosen otherwise. This is an aspect that we want to emphasise – citizens, ladies, kids, going there and having a look at what waste they are producing and how we are handling things,” explains Sheikh Saud.
As various ‘cells’ of the landfill fill up with garbage, they will be planted over or put to some other use that is compatible. “The landfill itself should not become a wasteland; the idea is to plan its use after the filling. It could be a park, a golf course, land for light industry……and the by product of any landfill is gas, which we can use to supply energy for industry or other purposes,” he continues.
Environmental regulations for industrial, commercial and municipal establishments (to be enacted under the authority and in support of Federal Law No. 24 of the UAE concerning the protection of the environment and its development), together with the monitoring and enforcement mechanisms are ready. These cover management of air quality, water quality, waste (solid, hazardous, chemical and industrial), and landfills – all following US EPA guidelines. “The document has been approved by Sheikh Saud and will be implemented pretty soon,” says Sakkal, “but Sheikh Saud didn’t want to just impose the regulation and do nothing else. He wanted to have the system in place and public awareness; then introduce the regulations that could be enforced. Unless we have 100 % of the supporting system in place, we cannot start penalising people.”
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Sakkal, Haque and Mehr accompany Earthsense to RAK’s Nakheel market, one of the places where the new waste collection containers have been installed. Some 2500 of them have been set up so far and they seem to be working. “The two bin system is working very well here – dry waste in one and wet waste in the other. The compliance is almost 80 %,” says Haque, as he examines the contents of containers placed in front of a shop. “So we think it is very innovative and suited to the local conditions. It can be implemented all over the UAE by not spending too much money. The four-bin system costs about 20 times as much as the two-bin.”
We make our way to the landfill site, passing rows of blue and green containers, the garbage collection truck and, as we proceed out of town, a composting facility where green waste is being chopped. When it is ready, this facility will have a capacity to produce 100 tonnes of natural organic fertiliser per day. We veer off the road and drive some 5 km into the desert passing donkeys running wild and camels wandering among the burnished dunes that are dotted with ghaf trees and assorted shrubs and, quite suddenly, descend into a large basin, a km square – the landfill site. Here 12 cells are being excavated the first one (nearing completion) is being lined with high density polyethylene plastic liner. Each cell can hold about a million cu m of garbage, and last some five years.
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Mehr, who has designed some 200 landfills in the United States explains the whole system to us. Composite liners (several layers of clay, plastic, sand and gravel) will prevent any leachate (‘garbage juice’) leaking into the soil and ground water. A 70,000-sq metre-sump will collect the leachate from where it will be extracted (this can be treated, if required) and re-injected into the landfill to promote bacterial activity. And there is a recovery system for gas (mainly methane) – a series of horizontal and vertical wells - that will collect gas, which will then be used to generate electricity, initially for the composting facility and “once we bring the power line here, then we can send electricity back - enough to supply 100s of houses. From one tonne trash, approx one kilowatt of electricity can be generated. There is a lot of electricity that will be coming out of this, almost indefinitely,” Mehr tells us.
The best thing is that the RAK landfill, with a designed life of over 50 years, is centrally located and can easily service the neighbouring emirates of Ajman, Umm Al Quwain and Sharjah. And since the plan is to eventually landscape the landfill, cell by cell, we can look forward to garbage greens.
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WHAT ON EARTH CAN WE DO?
Use less hazardous (and usually cheaper) cleaning products. For dishwasher soap, use one part borax and one part washing soda.
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