Many islands nations including those in the Indian sub-continent have resorts near beaches. Of particular interest to us are those in the Indian Ocean, Bay of Bengal and South China Sea regions such as Maldives, Mauritius, Phuket, Colombo, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos and many more including the Lakshwadeep/Andaman & Nicobar islands in India. All these islands have created resort facilities to attract tourists. Most of the resorts are located on beaches where there is constant cool breeze, quiet and calmness. After a year of hard work, people generally like to visit such islands/resorts for relaxing and unwinding.

There are countries whose main source of income itself is from tourism. Resorts re-energise tired humans who otherwise get caught in the routine, losing efficiency.

There is one problem though, that of waste generated by the throngs of tourists which, if not handled properly, could be the dampener in the whole scheme of things.

Resorts generate wastes of many kinds, food waste, packaging waste, paper and plastic, dry leaves, pet bottles, general garbage, etc. The average waste generated could be around 1 to 3 kg of mixed waste per guest.   These wastes need to be disposed of properly and on time if the resort is to attract regular swarms of tourists, as no tourist would like to visit a resort which has mountains of putrefying waste as well as plastics and papers strewn around.

The resorts have various options to dispose of the wastes generated. These include:

-        Landfilling

-        Composting

-        Recycling

-        Dumping

-        Incineration

Landfills, also called “sanitary landfills,” are very common. As these accommodate all types of refuse, they carry a number of risks, such as hazardous chemical runoff and odour.  To protect the surrounding ecosystem, waste disposal personnel construct landfills in a specific way. Landfills are expensive and need to be maintained constantly, ensuring leachate does not get into the water table.

While food waste is generally composted, the other wastes, if allowed to accumulate, could pose a serious problem as they occupy space and could be the permanent homes for insects, pests and reptiles.

Composting requires all organic wastes to be placed inside pits or bins, where, micro-organisms help these materials break down into a soil-like substance that has high nutrients.  Another common type of composting—known as vermicomposting—involves the use of worms to expedite the decomposition process and supplement the soil even further

Recycling can be a good option, provided there are recycling facilities available in the vicinity.

Incineration remains one of the most effective methods of waste disposal because it is capable of dramatically reducing waste volume and producing usable energy.

Another way to dispose of waste is to dump it into the ocean. This method is popular in coastal communities because of the convenience involved. However, it can be an expensive practice, requiring large barges to move the waste more than 15 kilometers away from shore before dumping.

More importantly, ocean dumping is perhaps the most environmentally harmful of all waste disposal methods. An excess of trash can easily harm the delicate ecosystem of the ocean and its inhabitants and reduce the nutrients that typically exist in the water. In addition, dumping is a major source of ocean water desalination.

Resorts that don’t have enough space to accommodate a landfill typically choose to incinerate their waste, this being the most viable, eco-friendly and economical option.

Incinerators are used for burning general garbage, packaging materials, burnable plastics, etc. Depending on waste segregation practice followed by the resort, there can be two types of wastes:

1.      Wet wastes which require fuel-assisted burning

2.      Dry wastes which can be incinerated in a controlled atmosphere without additional fuel.

Kitchen wastes and wet foliage go into the first category of incinerators. Dry leaves, packaging wastes, paper and plastic, PET bottles, etc., which are dry,  go into the `Trash Destructors` which are free-burning, requiring no fuel.

In both cases, no visible smoke will come out, as the waste is burnt and flue gas is burnt a second time within the incinerator system.

The trash destructor has no running cost at all and lasts quite a few years. So does the other system with fuel, but it has a running cost.

Haat`s incinerators and trash destructors are working in some of the well-known resorts and hotels around the world and in particular in:

-        Maldives

-        Mauritius

-        Sri Lanka

-        India

-        Fiji

-        Vietnam