Ahmedabad kids reimagine garbage van concept

Even as the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) has begun implementing waste segregation, three students of Class 11 at GNC English Medium School, Maninagar, have come up with a prototype of a multitasking garbage van. They said the vehicle does away with the need for fossil fuel, eases work of the garbage collector and helps sweep the roads.

The prototype — made by Yogesh Bardia, Mohit Khairnar and Rushi Patel — has qualified for National Children's Science Congress.

The students are apparently the only one from the city to gain entry into the Congress under the Waste to Wealth category. Dhrumin Pandya, director of the programme, said the students initially studied the garbage vans in Ahmedabad that collect the waste.

"They vans, because of their size, often lead to traffic snarls. The prototype is that of a vehicle that is leaner. They also added a vacuum sweep under the van as they found the internal roads of the city don't get vacuumed the way the main roads are done," said Pandya.

He said that as the vans often enter the internal roads, the vacuum should also ensure that the dust is swept. The design was made by the students under the guidance of Pandya and Nirbhai Jadav in the Atal Tinkering Lab set up in the school. "We also have a solar panel on the top which will help power the cycle with the help of a battery. This means the garbage van can be run in an eco-friendly way without relying on the fossil fuel," said Khairnar. It took the students around 20 days to come up with the prototype.

"Before we set about developing the prototype, we carried out a research on the vans for almost a month to know the changes," the student said. The prototype of the garbage van is such that the civic body can use its body for advertising purpose too.