KMC plan to treat wastewater to wash roads, water trees
Times of India | 30 January 2025
123 Kolkata: If everything goes well, the Kolkata Municipal Corporation will soon treat wastewater and purify it to an extent that the treated water can be used for washing roads and cars and watering trees. A huge volume of filtered water is wasted every day across the city for washing roads and watering trees. The KMC sewerage and drainage department has tied up with IIT Kharagpur for a successful implementation of such a project in Kolkata.
According to plans, accessing technologies from IIT Kharagpur, the KMC sewerage and drainage department will take up a pilot project either on Southern Avenue or at the Nonadanga drainage pumping station (located off EM Bypass) where daily wastewater coming from households will be treated and made usable for washing roads and watering plants. According to an agreement, IIT will provide technology for setting up a filtration system at the civic body's drainage pumping stations.
The pilot project will be able to treat and purify 50,000 litres of wastewater in a day. "Based on the results of the pilot project, we will extend the scope of such an innovative scheme to other parts of the city with a view to saving filtered water. The volume of water saved will be utilised to ensure that some of the city's dry pockets get more water," said mayor Firhad Hakim.
A team comprising experts from IIT Kharagpur on Wednesday visited Southern Avenue and Nonadanga, where the KMC is eager to set up its pilot project for treating wastewater. According to Sirsendu De, who has played an active role in materialising the pilot project on behalf of IIT Kharagpur, the technology will go a long way to put an end to the use of filtered water other than for drinking. "We have successfully devised a technology where wastewater can be treated and made usable for washing roads, cleaning cars, or even watering trees. We are now concentrating on the pilot project. Later, we may think of implementing it on a bigger platform," said De.