Turning Trash into Gold. A thread.

Karachi generates more than 13k tons of trash/solid waste daily, and if you live in Karachi, you know it's everywhere. Karachi generates about 0.44kg of trash per capita everyday. Garbage generated is a function of household wealth.

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Lower income households generate 0.19kg/person everyday, while higher income households generate 0.84kg / person everyday, basically 4x of lower income households. More than 70% of waste generated is a mix of organic, & non-organic waste, w/ some of latter being recyclable

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Organic waste can be collected and used for fertilizer compost. 3 tons of organic waste needs to be available for scalable production of fertilizer, which can be used in maintenance of public parks, or sold in the open market.  Plastic, metal, wood, etc. Can be recycled.

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Average cost for collection and disposal of garbage in low-income countries like Pakistan is roughly to be $30/ton, daily cost of around $390k, or annual outlay of $142m.On household level, the avg. monthly cost for garbage collection & disposal would be $2.96, or PKR500/mth

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Procing can be considerably low for lower-income households, the same can be compensated by charging a higher price for higher income households, making collection and disposal process self-sustaining, rather than being susceptible to budget politics of provincial & city gov

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Trash is gold, and can be used for the generation of electricity through the waste-to-energy process.  It is estimated that approximately 2,200 tons of municipal solid-waste are required daily for the generation of 50 Mega-Watt (MW) of power.

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If only 40% of garbage is collected & used, it can generate up to 100 MW of electricity.  At an initial outlay of roughly $2m per MW, or an investment of $200 m, it is possible to generate electricity from trash at a cost of PKR 11per kilowatt-hour (kWh).

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Development of an integrated solid waste management system, which can clean the city while using the same garbage to generate electricity requires political will more than anything else.  Such a system will not only clean up the city but also provide indigenous power.

8/n

A public-private partnership which has the support of all stakeholders of the city & the province can do wonders & sustainably resolve garbage issue. Without political will, nothing can be done & one of the largest cities in world can continue to be an ever-expanding dump

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