‘Circular economy is much more than waste mgmt’

NAGPUR: CSIR- National environmental engineering research institute (Neeri) organized their annual Prof P Khanna memorial lecture at their auditorium, on Tuesday.

Paravastu Rambabu, chief executive office of RSM GC Advisory Services, Mumbai and former deputy director at Neeri, delivered the lecture on the topic ‘Can circular economy be the next renewable energy?’

J S Pandey, chief scientist and science secretary of institute was present among the dignitaries on dais.

Remembering the dynamic personality of Khanna, Rambabu said, “While conducting researches, focusing on the appropriate concept is more important that merely exploring the data. Khanna was a committed and disciplined researcher and wise enough to scrunitize things precisely.”

Citing some examples, he said that Khanna raised the status of the institute at the national and international level, and initiated vital R & D areas which brought revolutionary transformation.

Speaking about the recently emerging concept of circular economy he said, “It is slightly different from renewable energy. Here, we don’t focus on simply recycling the product but try to repair it or use its elements to their maximal capacity. This will extend the life of the product and slows its deterioration process.”

In the regenerative system of circular economy, we design a product in a fashion where waste can be recycle, its parts can be repaired and reassembled to make it function like before. It’s more than just waste management, he added.

PET bottles in mixed waters can be incinerated but economic pay off from the energy generate is quite low. But recovering the bottles material value through mixed recyclables or bottle to bottle recycling can generate high economic pay off.

He informed, “At present, PET bottles are among the easiest products to recycle, and it is no wonder that a large number of them are being recycled in India due to which it has grown to become a multi-crore industry.”