TREES AGAINST WASTE: How Dandora Students Are Tackling Toxic Air from Nairobi’s largest dumpsite

TREES AGAINST WASTE: How Dandora Students Are Tackling Toxic Air from Nairobi’s largest dumpsite

Dandora Secondary School students have taken the initiative to plant bamboo trees in response to the terrible air pollution caused by the Dandora landfill, Kenya’s largest dumpsite.

The school, located in Embakasi North Constituency, Nairobi County, borders the dumpsite on one side and is barely 900 meters away, making it heavily affected by the gasses emitted by the Dandora Dumpsite.

Eutychus Maina, the school principal, initiated the project in 2023 after noticing a high number of respiratory diseases among children and teachers.

“The dumpsite produces gas in the morning and also in the afternoon,” Allan Sila, a student at Dandora Secondary School, said in an interview with France 24.

He added that some of the challenges they grapple with include the smell and smoke that emanate from the dumpsite.

He went on to say that burning items at the dumpsite produces smoke, which affects their respiratory systems and causes some pupils to get asthma.

The school, which also gets external donations for the purpose, hopes to cover the 900-meter region between the school and the dumpsite with bamboo trees.

Currently, almost 4,000 trees of diverse types have been planted.

Aderiana Mbandi, an Africa Regional Air Quality Expert, remarked that planting bamboo trees creates a barrier “in terms of the air that is coming through, especially when you look at the fine particles.”

The Dandora dumpsite encompasses around 30 acres and receives approximately 850 tonnes of solid trash every day from Nairobi residents (a city with a population of more than 6 million).

The Dandora dumpsite was officially opened in 1975 with World Bank financing, and 26 years later, in 2001, it was deemed full to capacity. However, dumping continues at the landfill.

According to Auditor General Nancy Gathungu’s report, a German firm contracted by City Hall to build a Ksh28 billion power plant at the Dandora dumpsite backed out in 2016 because the county lacked a title deed for the area.

However, on Thursday, May 30, Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja announced that his administration had signed a Ksh50 billion Public-Private Partnership (PPP) agreement with a Chinese firm to build Kenya’s first waste-to-energy plant in Dandora.

“Met with China National Electric Engineering Co. President Wu Guisheng and our teams earlier today at City Hall. We shortly commence the construction of Kenya’s first Waste to Energy Plant in Dandora, a 50 Billion PPP awarded to CNEEC,” Sakaja communicated via his official channels.

The plant is planned to generate 45 megawatts of power from solid trash, making it a game changer and possibly the most sustainable way to deal with the rubbish that continues to pile up at the Dandora dumpsite.

Aside from creating major health dangers to Dandora and its surroundings, many inhabitants rely on the dumpsite for survival, earning their daily bread by working there.

According to a survey from the National Environmental Complaints Committee (NECC), Kenya generates 22,000 tons of rubbish per day, with Nairobi County contributing 2,400 tonnes.

The trash makeup is 60 to 70% organic, 20% plastic, 10% paper, 2% metal, and 1% medical waste.

TREES AGAINST WASTE: How Dandora Students Are Tackling Toxic Air from Nairobi’s largest dumpsite