Road and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday said that making bitumen, a key input for laying roads, from agricultural waste such as rice husk can help save up to ₹30,000 crore annually in import bills.

“India requires around 80 lakh tonnes of bitumen annually for roads. Of this around 50 lakh tonnes is provided by domestic refineries for processing crude oil, and around 25-30 lakh tonnes is imported costing around 25,000-30,000 crore,”Gadkari said at Assocham’s 2023 annual session.

Bio-Bitumen

Recently, the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and the Central Road Research Institute (CRRI) developed technology to make bitumen from rice husk, which is supposed to be better than bitumen extracted from crude oil. This makes 70 per cent bitumen and the rest is bio char or organic carbon. Organic char can enhance farm productivity. Trails have been completed and machinery has also been developed, he added.

“I want to open up to 1,000 units in rural India. One unit costs around ₹20 lakh. The Road Ministry will buy all this bitumen. This will completely do away with burning of husk or agri waste which leads to pollution. There is a project in Panipat for producing 1 lakh tonne bio-ethanol and 150 tonnes bio-bitumen daily. Farmers in States such as Delhi, Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh will benefit,” the Minister noted.

Waste to wealth

Discussing saving fuel cost by focusing on alternative fuels, Gadkari said, “Our focus should be on converting waste to wealth. For example, Delhi has three mountains of solid waste. Within the next two years this waste will be used in road construction, flattening the waste fields. We are focussing on developing the outer-outer ring road which passes over 13 railways lines. A road map has been prepared to shift wholesale markets and warehouses to designated zones around this zone. This will decongest Delhi—commercial vehicles will bypass entry into Delhi, reducing pollution problem.”

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