Garbage incinerators operated inefficiently
Bambang Nurbianto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
While the City Sanitation Agency is rocked by alleged graft related to the purchase of 10 incinerators funded by last year's city budget, the facts show that a number of incinerators that were purchased earlier were not properly operated.
Saidin, 56, an operator of a waste incinerator in Lenteng Agung subdistrict, South Jakarta, said that the incinerator could not be operated efficiently as he did not receive enough kerosene from the South Jakarta Sanitation Office.
"We should have received 90 liters of kerosene per day to operate the incinerator, but I only got 50 liters. I do not know where the other 40 liters goes," he told The Jakarta Post on Tuesday.
Due to the lack of fuel, Saidin said he had to make the best of the kerosene he had. Instead of pouring the kerosene inside the tank of the stove to burn the waste, Saidin just pours the fuel over the waste directly and sets fire to it.
As a result, the process produces a large amount of smoke and is against environmentally friendly waste management techniques, an essential objective of burning waste in an incinerator in the first place.
The incinerator, if operated full-time, from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., could burn up to 14 cubic meters per day, according to Saidin.
It is one of five incinerators that were purchased using the 2000 city budget, but Saidin said the one in Lenteng Agung started to operate in June 2001.
Last month, some city councillors revealed alleged graft in the purchase of 10 new incinerators using the Rp 3.2 billion funds of the 2001 city budget.
Head of City Sanitation Agency Slamet Limbong has admitted the irregularities, saying they were perpetrated by his predecessor, Saksono Soehodo, who was dismissed by Governor Sutiyoso in December over his failure to resolve garbage problems in the capital.
Critics say the failures in waste management have had much to do with rampant corruption in the agency.
Tarsa, 50, another incinerator operator at Petamburan subdistrict, Central Jakarta, said that the burning machine was operated only once every two days due to the limited supply of fuel provided by the Central Jakarta sanitation office.
"If we operated it every day, we would need a lot of fuel," Tarsa told the Post on Monday, adding that the incinerator could only burn about eight cubic meters per day.
Tarsa also said that he could only deal with around half of the amount of garbage brought to the incinerator station. The other half was carried to Bantar Gebang dump.
Although the incinerator in Petamburan has not been functioning optimally, a new incinerator that was purchased by the 2001 budget, was also positioned at the same site.
Limbong argued that his agency had found it difficult to seek a place for the new incinerator.
He added that so far the city administration had 15 incinerators. Five were funded by the 2000 city budget while 10 were funded by the 2001 budget.
This year the city administration plans to purchase some 25 more incinerators.
But Limbong could not guarantee that all 25 incinerators would be purchased this year, saying that his agency still had no idea where to place the machines.
"We set a target to purchase 25 incinerators this year, but implementation depends on the availability of land for the project," Limbong told the Post on Tuesday.
The city produces at least 25,000 cubic meters of household garbage per day. Most of the waste is disposed of at the Bantar Gebang dump site in Bekasi. Last December, Bekasi closed the dump due to environmental damage. The two administrations later signed a new MoU that lasts until the end of the year and which could be extended until 2003.
In the meantime, the city is making an effort to handle the waste by signing a cooperation agreement with an American company on how to deal with the household waste, while an Australian company has agreed to invest in the management of human waste.