Dr SS-Keynote-Bangalore-Dec-14-09

Public Water & Sanitation Projects in India- Deviating from the Beaten Track

International Conference on Urban Water Management

Challenges and Options

Jnana Jyothi Auditorium, Central College, Palace Road,

Bangalore, Dec-14-2009

Er. Dr. S. Sundaramoorthy, FRSH (UK), PE IE-India

Dedicated to my moorings in Bangalore

The oldest & stately Vani

Vilas Hospital where I was blessed to be born in 1943

The oldest RBANMS school and

founder who educated me

till 1958

Objectives of Water Management in Indian Conditions

• “objective” utilization of the allocated funds, more so, the grant funds and meeting the objectives of safe and sustainable technologies.

• Austerity drive in expenditure controls,

• The key is to maximize the benefit in terms of population coverage under a given finance.

• It is not a question of pointless expansion of geographical coverage but needful expansion.

• Some possibilities are presented in this paper

WTP Sludge-The biggest lurking Threat to Future

• Sludge - dead / dying algae / microbes, viruses

• We take it for granted as “non-hazardous”

• Some can be spores and re-germinate in future

• Irradiation by Gamma Ray is wholesome

• Irradiation by UV in sunrays is economical

• In monsoons, this is impossible

• In fact sludge can be washed out in monsoons

• Our WTP specs are yet to address this seriously

Case of WTP sludge in Hoganekkal Water Supply Project

• Raw water is from Cauvery river in reserve forest

• Taken to a conventional WTP in reserve forest

• Chemical coagulation in proposed

• Sludge is “disposed” in the local area itself

• No proposal for irradiation by Gamma ray or UV

• In monsoons, the sludge will be washed out downhill

• First of all, there is no adequate alkalinity in water

• Alum will dissolve and result in Alzheimer disease

Photoes are in succeeding slides

The Raw Water Source amid Reserve Forest

Setting of Hoganekkal Water Supply Project

WTP

Setting of Hoganekkal Water Supply Project- WTP

WTP

Hoganekkal Water Supply Project-Site of WTP

The picture that tells all about WTP sludge &Reserve Forest

Sludge is “disposed” here and monsoon washes all over to habitations, rivers etc downhill. What happens to ecology, wildlife, fauna, flora in virgin foreststry

How come this project ever got the Environmental Clearance ?

Case of WTP sludge in Hoganekkal Water Supply Project

• Raw water is from Cauvery river in reserve forest

• Taken to a conventional WTP in reserve forest

• Chemical coagulation in proposed

• Sludge is “disposed” in the local area itself

• No proposal for irradiation by Gamma ray or UV

• In monsoons, the sludge will be washed out downhill

• First of all, there is no adequate alkalinity in water

• Alum will dissolve and result in Alzheimer disease

• There is an option of sludge free technology

The Puducherry STP Case Study

17 MLD sanctioned under the JnNURM grant funding

Tender document specifies SBR with extended aeration process and that “The contractor shall furnish a process train to ensure that the offered treatment process is the most appropriate and state of the art in terms of both efficacy of treatment and cost”.

Clearly, extended aeration was inappropriate in electricity cost.

There are conventional ASP technologies used by Chennai STPs where biomethanation & gas utilization produces on site electricity & there is no connection to local public electricity grid.

In the case of the above STP at Puducherry, the entire electricity had to be purchased from the local grid perpetually.

A case of perpetual loss of taxpayer’s money ?

The Case of Mandated Consultants

A classic example is the Chennai industrial reuse of treated sewage project sanctioned by JBIC (then OECF) for USD 165 million to renovate 100 MLD of city sewage and sell to industries and conserve fresh water which is otherwise wasted on industrial use.

The foreign mandated consultant prepared the designs and estimates to the effect that the specifications for equipments was more of a cut & paste from the specifications of their country with the result that electrical control panels had to be imported by ship and synthetic containers had to be imported on ship on volume occupied basis.

As a result, the cost overrun was prohibitive and the project closed down and the fees to the consultant went literally down the drain.

The pity was a similar project was actually working at Chennai itself in two local public sector firms and these were done up without any consultant and with local sources only. (Photo next slide)

The recent JnNURM grant funded country’s first ever 100 MLD permeate seawater desalination plant at Rs. 872 crores at Chennai put to tender.

The local & overseas consultant consortium specifies seawater pretreatment by direct disc filters before RO.

Red Water problems of recent challenges in Arabian gulf countries in similar desalination plants, is not addressed.

The earlier similar sized plant under completion at Chennai itself has the needed chemical addition and gravity settlers.

Another case of consultancy benefit ?? (Photoes Next slides)

Another case of Consultants expertise ??

The disc filter (or) Strainer used for first filtering of seawater. These are like pressure sand filters and are backwashable in situ

The Typical Seawater Pretreatment Options for Seawater before RO

The most recent remedy instituted in Arabian Gulf SWRO plants to safeguard their already installed SWRO plants from Red Algae problems

Dissolved Air

Filtration

The Sedimentation Tanks in the 100 MLD (Product) SWRO Plant which is nearing completion as a DBOOT project at Chennai

A PILOT STUDY USING SEAWATER R O MEMBRANES INCOMBINATION WITH VARIOUS PRETREATMENTS TO MEET THE

CHALLENGES OF PACIFIC SEAWATER DESALINATION

Rich Franks, Hydranautics, Oceanside, CADr. Mark Wilf, Hydranautics, Oceanside, CA

Nikolay Voutchkov, Poseidon Resources, San Diego, CAPravin Murkute, Hydranautics, Oceanside, CA

Jason Kizer, Zenon Environmental, San Diego, CA

Both the media filtration and membrane filtration pretreatment were able to produce RO feed water of satisfactory quality during the “dry” periods and in absence of algae blooms.

During the periods of heavy rain and/or algae blooms the elevated content of organic matter in the pretreatment filtrate from both the sand media and the membrane pretreatment systems, resulted in accelerated RO membrane biofouling.

The project for 100 MLD (product) SWRO plant recently tendered and price bid opened on Dec-9-09. No DAF, No flocculation-sedimentation. A case of sure shut down when when algal blooms occur in the sea ??? The project is a grant under JnNURM taxpayer’s money ??? Yet another case of consultant’s “contribution” to a Rs 1100 crore project. The consultant gets away ??????

As per the Tender Specs

Sanitation in Tier II and III citiesThe JnNURM grant funding is available for sewerage schemes also. Here again, when it comes to sanitation, it is always the typical under ground sewerage scheme.

The under ground sewers cost as much as 65 % of the cost of a sewerage scheme. These sewers are needed in tier I cities no doubt but then they are an avoidable luxury in moffusil and panchayats.

Instead the fact that in all new colonies, invariably people have already provided septic tanks needs to be recognized and it is enough if the septic tank effluents can be collected in roadside drains with removable slabs and taken to an STP.

This way, the grant funding can cover an extra geographical coverage by as much as about 200 %. In addition, indiscriminate cutting of roads especially in rocky terrain are also avoided.

Photoes in next slides

Septic Tank & Upflow filter in construction

Septic Tank & Upflow filter completed

Twin drains for SW and upflow filter effluent

Clean, Odour free, Self cleaning sewerage

The oxidation & maturation pond

The valuable algal population in pond

The lush green growth of weeds receiving the treated sewage is seen in stark contrast with the nutrient starved barren grass in the land adjoining the ponds and which were once salt pans & which right now are abandoned after the Tsunami engulfed the pan area in 2005. The greenery is reviving

Renovation of lost land

The Inauguration & Joy-2007

The author honoured by The President, Caritas International, (the organization which funded the entire habitation infrastructure except the

roads and street lights)

Has it to be this way forever ? Possible way out

By virtue of the above, smaller magnitude routine schemes are having problems of sludge, no way of using sludgeless technologies and major schemes end up more as non-starters, the question is should these schemes go on like these and should the grant funds continue to be getting scattered without ever reaching the desired objective of tax payer’s money.

Some possible ways can be

* Limited DBOOT Concept * Induction of Consultants Realistically

Limited DBOOT Concept

Grant funds released only on public competitive tenders

Only when estimates are available and in turn only when previous works are available for the estimate.

As long as this cycle goes on, there is no way of inducting newer technologies.

Tenders can be invited by throwing open the technology and based on the condition that the successful tenderer to design, engineer, build & successfully do O&M for some two years. The tender decision can be based on the net capitalized cost plus land cost on two year deferred.

Induction of Consultants Realistically

Overseas human expertise needs to be inducted so that we benefit from those experiences, but then, the indiscriminate populating of a consultancy component needs to be avoided.

Agreements at the time of negotiating a loan should safeguard this

Indian nationals with long stints overseas if inducted will be able to comprehend local challenges better and readily.

Despite all these, Murphy’s Law may sometimes become true in that “If a thing can go wrong, it will”.

Checks & balances on consultants and a tag on their integrity in framing tender document specifications for equipments purchases

The longing of a flower vendor girl relegated to the streets in rain & sun

We are all gifted in that we have had education, we have this lifestyle, we have the office to “sit and write” and we are in this hall today

When we get our own opportunity to partake in public based welfare projects let us try to ensure that taxpayers’s money is conserved

The birds about to be snatched from their “mother” for culling due to “Bird flu”

Surely the birds were not at fault ??

Suppose akin Env pollution builds up and affects babies, will we “cull” them ?

Let us care

for them also

I wont give my children to be culled