General News of Friday, 25 November 2016

Source: classfmonline.com

Mahama opens faecal treatment plant at Lavender Hill

File photo of a feacal treatment plant File photo of a feacal treatment plant

President John Dramani Mahama is to commission a new faecal treatment plant at Lavender Hill in Accra on Friday, November 25.

Construction of the plant commenced in 2012 at a cost of USD $25million with the aim of processing human excreta into biogas for use by the public.

The plant undertakes various recycling processes which include screening, primary settling, raw septage treatment, and sludge dewatering to ensure that the end product is safe and of high quality to be used in efficient energy generation.

The plant, which has a 20-year lifespan, will be owned and operated by Sewerage Systems (Ghana) Limited (SSGL), a subsidiary of Zoomlion Ghana Limited.

With the commencement of operation of the facility, the dumping of faecal waste into the ocean is expected to be halted.

In an interview with Class News on Friday, November 25, Communications Manager of Zoomlion Ghana Limited, Robert Coleman, told Class News: “We have been dumping raw faecal matter into the ocean…no wonder Ghana has been labelled as the seventh dirtiest country in the world. Today we are decommissioning Lavender Hill to start operations with the recycling facility, which means that we will no longer dump faecal matter into the ocean.”

He added that the facility will be a comprehensive, holistic waste recycling plant which will treat and process both liquid and solid waste for use as energy.