Eden Gardens: The Kolkata Knight Riders on Sunday stumped waste generated on match days at the Eden Gardens fair and square.
The team on Sunday installed an organic waste converter at Eden to segregate leftover food items from the 900-odd kg of waste that a typical IPL match at the stadium generates. The machine will recycle the waste into organic manicure.
The venture, a part of the Kolkata Knight Riders' (KKR) clean-sweep mission, was formally announced on the occasion of Earth Day, in the presence of the team's co-owner Juhi Chawla, managing director & CEO Venky Mysore, head coach Jacques Kallis and assistant coach Simon Katich.
The team has tied up with Reddonatura, a private company associated with integrated waste management and food waste solutions, to set up the converter.
The machine has been installed just beneath the gallery adjacent to B block at Eden.
The season's first IPL match on April 8 between KKR and Royal Challengers Bangalore saw the machine convert 1,900kg organic waste - noodles, bits of pizza bread, luchi-alur dum - into compost that would be used by the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB).
The waste is first manually segregated in the trash bin. Non-food waste such as plastic bottles and paper are taken out of the stadium to a recycling facility. The food waste is deposited in the new machine. "It takes 24 to 36 hours for the machine to generate the compost," said Vikram Khandelwal of Reddonatura.
The KKR had launched the recycling initiative last year. Food waste collected in trash bins would be dumped into vats outside the stadium but only a part of it would be segregated. The on-spot segregation and recycling of food items, which accounts for the bulk of waste, started this year.
"Our aim is to reduce waste. We have enlisted the help of sponsors by banning the use of plastic cheer items in the stadium. Efforts are on reduce use of plastic bags as well, replacing them with cloth bags during matches," Juhi said.
Metro had reported last year how 900kg waste generated after every match at Eden remains strewn across the galleries and the food court, accompanied by the odour of stale food.
"Now the food waste will be turned into organic manicure that can be used by the CAB to maintain the grass on the ground or for the plants dotting the different corners of the stadium," said Vikram Khandelwal of Reddonatura.
KKR engaged Vital Waste, a recycling and waste management company in Calcutta, to carry out an audit report on waste generated during the season's first three matches.
Recycling waste is a standard practice at most modern stadiums overseas. At Wembley, London, organic waste is sent to an anaerobic digestion plant to produce energy and fertilisers. Melbourne Cricket Ground recycles around 70 per cent of waste generated during a major sporting event.
All other waste generated at Eden such as paper and cardboard(4,000kg), plastic (1,650kg) and metal (550kg) has also been collected, segregated and recycled appropriately by the Vital Waste. This reduces methane and carbon-dioxide emission in the landfills.
"KKR has always been conscious of the footprint we leave on the environment. In fact, we were also able to garner support of the community members to help with the recycling efforts and almost 80 per cent of the waste has been reused and recycled and the rest given to licensed recyclers," Mysore said.
Last year, around 19,173kg of the total generated segregated waste of 20,606 kg was successfully recycled and just 6.8 per cent sent to the landfill.
