Financial sustainability of construction and demolition waste recycling plants

The annual construction and demolition (C&D) waste generated in India has been estimated to be 150 million tons. Currently, with only about 16 C&D waste recycling centers in India, with most of them having a capacity less than 500 tons per day, only an estimated 1% waste is recycled, a small proportion of waste is used for filling and levelling, and the rest simply goes to landfills, is left in place, or else dumped by roadsides. It may be noted that though the technology for recycling C&D waste and producing useful products is available, the idea has not really taken off in India. Some entrepreneurs have been forced to abandon their efforts to start recycling plants due to lack of profits and/or absence of policy support and regular customers. This research seeks to formulate a simple model for financial sustainability of C&D waste recycling plants in India and examine it in the context of available data for revenue and expenditure. Data was collected from various reports, research papers, and personal interviews. The study also provides insight into the barriers and possible solutions for improved financial sustainability of such plants and shows that C&D waste recycling can be easily sustainable through simple changes in the overall C&D waste management processes.