This story is from October 15, 2016

Neeri to plan city’s solid waste management, sewage treatment

Neeri to plan city’s solid waste management, sewage treatment
(Representative image)
NAGPUR: In a first-of-its-kind agreement, the state government has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (Neeri) under the Swachh Maharashtra initiative. In Nagpur, Neeri’s main focus area will be solid waste management and sewage treatment, apart from bio-medical waste management, rejuvenation of lakes and other environment related issues.
Neeri will now provide technical guidance on various developmental aspects of Smart cities including solid waste management, sanitation, urban planning, health, water supply and sewage treatment.

According to chief minister Devendra Fadnavis, open defecation continues to be the biggest challenge for the state. “We have suffered a lot due to non-planning of cities. We are determined to make all cities open defecation free by 2017 but it is possible only when Swachh Maharashtra becomes a people’s movement,” said Fadnavis in a recent function in Mumbai. He had also stressed that future development projects should be planned taking into consideration environmental aspects.
Neeri director Rakesh Kumar said that technologies of other developed countries would also be adopted. “With our headquarters here, Nagpur is very special for us and we will be chalking out a management plan for solid waste management and sewage treatment along with the civic body. From now on, Neeri will prepare the city’s Environment Status Report (ESR) every year,” said Kumar.
Kumar added that the development plans will be site-specific, depending on the key problems of different cities of the state. “Nagpur is still better than cities like Pune and Mumbai when it comes to air pollution. We will also focus on developing surrounding rural areas from where cities get their basic resources,” he said.
Neeri has also established a Centre for Strategic Urban Management (C-SUM), which aims to involve urban local bodies and stakeholders for building smart sustainable cities. “We are communicating with local authorities and will prepare management plans after collecting and analysing data,” said Kumar.
As reported by TOI earlier, Neeri has also signed a MoU with NMC for protecting environment under the Smart City project. “For ensuring efficient planning, we are inviting NMC officials to work with us,” Kumar said.
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