EFFICIENT AND ECO-FRIENDLY MANAGEMENT OF DIFFERENT TYPES OF SOLID WASTE USING WINDROW COMPOSTING TECHNIQUE AND EFFECT OF SEWAGE AS ADDITIVE ON PHYSICO-CHEMICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF COMPOSTS

Solid waste management is a crucial issue in developing countries due to large amounts of waste being generated from different sources. Aerobic windrow composting of various wastes was carried out to create compost from various wastes for use as a nutritious soil fertilizer and to optimize waste material by employing sewage as an addition to minimize composting time and improve soil nutritional value. Four composting windrows were formed with three different types of wastes i.e. first windrow was animal waste + garden waste treated by sewage water, second windrow was food waste + garden waste treated by sewage water, third windrow was mixture of wastes treated by sewage water, and the last windrow was also mixture of wastes but treated by tap water. The compost of mixture of wastes treated by sewage water was found better than the other three windrows as having pH 8.69, Organic Content 59.25%, Moisture Content 28.09%, Carbon 27.85%, Nitrogen 0.66%, C/N ratio 42.2, Phosphorous 1.4% and Potassium 0.84%. If composting of mixture of wastes like animal waste, food waste and garden waste treated with sewage water is carried out, then it will give better results and also reduce the composting period by 30%.