Chapter 4. Energy Generation from Metropolitan and Urban Wastes in India

India is one of the 7^th largest country in the world in terms of area available under its jurisdiction and second most populous country in world after China. This makes Asia as one of the most populous continent in world. The population estimation from grass root level for covering various aspects like sex ratio, population trends, status of human settlements, literacy rate and population density etc. are important to assess India’s potential in terms of manpower and all related outcomes by virtue of housing huge human settlements. Census of India, 2011 is a ma or source to contribute and also for understanding the different parameters. India in last decade i.e. between 2001 and 2011 has seen population growth by 17.7%. Further, its annual growth rate is 1.11% (Census of India, 2011) which gives an idea of population statistics for each passing year. Hence, it can be said that it houses one of the fastest growing human settlements and therefore a potential hot-spot for various activities and modalities to be adopted for catering to huge population. India in various many public domains and discussions has been essentially projected as a rural nation, hot spot for growing economy and sprouting market but with significant urban infrastructure deficit. According to census of India, the country’s official percentage of population increased from 28% in 2001 to 31% in 2011 (Census of India, 2011). The Census had also projected that in a decade more people have been added to urban population than the rural population and the future projections showed that by 2041 urban population will constitute more than half of the total population of country. Therefore, with such huge growth patterns of human inhabitance the problem that will be needed to be addressed more than anything is solid waste management. The generation of solid waste is an end product of human’s day to day living on the planet and therefore it can’t be stopped from producing but needs to be effectively managed else the planet will have no clean place to live but to reside on waste.