[Assam] Brahmaputra islands to provide landfill

[Dilip and Dil Deka]

It sounds like a good idea. Is there a downside to it?
Brahmaputra needs dredging and the plant site needs dirt - good match as I can see it.
Dilip
 
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Brahmaputra islands to provide landfill
By Ron Duarah
 DIBRUGARH, June 16 – The river Brahmaputra is being scouted as a possible source for silt (fine grain sand) for use as landfill at the 3000 – bigha site for the Assam Gas Cracker Project. Work on the project has just begun, and engineers of BCPL (Brahmaputra Cracker & Polymer Limited) and EIL (Engineers India Limited) have approached the Dibrugarh civil administration for possible sites from where earth, silt and sand can be extracted to meet the landfill requirement. 

Sources in BCPL and EIL said the requirement of landfill aggregate is huge, and is initially pegged at a mind boggling 75 lakh cubic metres. The landfill works alone are estimated to cost about Rs 250 crore. Such quantities of silt or earth is unlikely to be available from a single site, except if the Brahmaputra is exploited, said a BCPL official. Moreover, land filling on such a scale has not been taken up before in eastern India for any purpose.

Last week, officials of the Dibrugarh administration and Forest department went around several places in the vicinity of the gas cracker project site, scouting for areas from where earth or silt could be excavated from. They have pinpointed a couple of places, including the possibility of excavating sand from the Buri Dehing river. However, the civil officials have also expressed their concern at the possible transport bottleneck if these places are to be used, as a major highway traffic jam could not be ruled out. Then there is the potential of a public outcry against excavation of paddy fields. 

It is anticipated that once the landfill work commences, there would be about 400 ten-wheel trucks on the road, which would congest the already busy national highway between Dibrugarh and Jorhat, and may also lead to major traffic snarls. 

Another possibility the BCPL and EIL engineers are mulling is the induction of slurry pumping systems, to pump silt straight from the river to the gas cracker site. The system comprises laying of a pipeline, installation of slurry pumps and booster pumps. The procedure would involve making a fine paste of silt and water, and push it through a pipeline to pour the material at the required site. This system, if put to use, would negate the use of a massive number of dumper trucks, avoid the need to build a road, and also avoid any road congestion by trucks carrying silt/earth. 

To avoid nightmarish conditions on the national highway and also to cause least disturbance and annoyance to the civil population on the Moran – Dibrugarh belt, BCPL has been informally advised by the Dibrugarh administration to exploit the Brahmaputra for the landfill requirement. "Of course, this would entail construction of an adequate service road from the river bank to the gas cracker site, but is the best available option," remarked a senior revenue official here. He said a couple of Brahmaputra islands (char, in local parlance) could be scooped up to meet the land filling requirements of the gas cracker project. The civil administration here is of the studied opinion that such an exercise would be beneficial for Brahmaputra river navigation too, provided the excavation of river silt is done from demarcated areas as mapped by the Forest Department, in consultation with the Water Resources Department, engineers of the Bogibeel Bridge Project and
 the Inland Water Transport Department. 

Meanwhile, work on the rehabilitation of gas cracker – affected families (those whose lands and homes have been acquired for setting up of the Rs 5,600 crore project) have begun in right earnest, and people are building their homes in the designated areas, said a senior district administration official here. He said the families are being provided financial and material assistance to build their new homes by the government, and that the evacuated families are cooperating with the administration, much to the relief of both BCPL and the state government.