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rain water harvesting
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A SPE
CIAL FEATURE CELEBRATING THE UN INITIATIVE ON MARCH 22
Geeta Desai
India is a groundwater civilisation and we are the largest consumers of ground water. With abundant rainfall, depend-ability on rainwater has now started posing a big challenge to the country in recent years as the rainfall has be-come scanty and there are not enough water bodies to hold water.
In Mumbai with a population of 1.24 crore —and more than 20 lakh floating population — the city needs 4500 MLD water. But the total water drawn for Mumbai from six lakes is 3965 MLD. However, the city receives approxi-mately 2584.40 MLD water from six lakes after 273 MLD en route supply and treatment losses and 30 per cent losses during distribution and trans-mission in the city.
Considering the present trend of de-velopment, the city’s water demand is expected to rise substantially in near future. Middle Vaitarna is the only source which is expected to contribute to the city as the other sources are in study stage. The options like rainwater harvesting and recycling have not been able to contribute a considerable share in the water supply inspite of the efforts being taken by the corporation like the
introduction of telescopic tariff and new developments. Excessive ground-water extraction is extremely hazard-ous for a coastal city like Mumbai.
Under the circumstances, Mumbai needs a proper plan to systematically reduce its daily per capita water con-sumption permanently and the BMC is taking various steps under its ‘Water Distribution Improvement Program’.
Stressing on the need of the hour, Suprabha Marathe, executive engineer of the BMC, who heads the Rainwater Harvesting Cell said that RWH is the most cheap and best option. However, she said that the challenges faced by the civic body in bringing about the change in the approach of the people
for RWH is very difficult.“People neither want to save water
nor they want to stop using groundwa-ter. They don’t bother to recharge the groundwater. Presently citizens are getting water so they don’t realise its importance, but once the water stock will start receeding in future, a time will come when each individual family will have to make their own arrange-ments. The city should be prepared before the worst comes,” she said.
“Amongst all the other alternatives - using groundwater from bore-wells and wells, desalination and recycling, rainwater harvesting is the simplest and indigenous technology being prac-ticed. The concept involves collection
of rainwater by individual plot owner in artificial tanks and natural aquifers. “RWH not only creates self-sufficiency but also raises ground water table, im-proves the quality of water, reduces soil erosion and prevents sea regression,” said Marathe.
“BMC has made RWH mandatory to the newly developed properties in the city having plot area of more than 1000 sq. mts after October 1, 2002. The con-dition will be made compulsory to ex-isting buildings in near future. Never-theless, recycling of grey water has been already made compulsory for buildings having centralised air condi-tioning plants,” said Marathe adding
that up to March 2012 more than 3000 buildings have implemented RWH in their new developments.
Mumbai has more than 7000 dug up wells and bore wells. Revival of aban-doned wells and replenishing dug up and bore wells by RWH will also help in improving quality of ground water.
Tap rainwater to end water woesVaitarna Lake, Mumbai
Rainwater harvesting is the simplest method of conserving water and maintaining ground water table
Dilnaz Boga
In an attempt to set right the enormous environmental destruction due to urbani-sation, several corporate houses and other organisations are pitching in, in the form of CSR to conserve water.
Corporate houses such as the Tatas, HCC, Reliance, Pepsico India, Ambuja Cements and Hindalco are setting up projects all over the country.
Corporates are focusing on regions where
water availa-
bility is already acute and where those living below the poverty line are hit the hardest. Hindustan Construction Company (HCC), which recently bagged the award for best Social Investment Strategy at the World CSR Congress, began to focus on water conservation as a consequence of its concerns about the business risks posed by physi-cal scarcity, where there is no sufficient water to meet de-mand and economic scarcity, where communities lack the infrastructure and/or financial capacity to access the water they require.
HCC, the only Indian company to be featured in a climate report issued by the UNGC and United Na-tions’ Environment Pro-gramme, has not only in-stalled rainwater harvesting projects and
artificial ponds for water management and augmentation in Faridabad and
Delhi but has also constructed de-salination plants in Mumbai as a
part of CSR.Lawyer and environmentalist
Girish Raut feels that industriali-sation has done irreparable
damage to our natural resources, leading to calamities and man-made droughts.
“What are being offered as solutions to circumvent these problems are the prob-lem themselves,” Raut laughs. Global warming and water scarcity is a by-prod-uct of urbanisation at the cost of the en-
vironment. We are suffering the con-sequences of having a growing
GDP and exploiting energy re-sources for market gain, he explained.
Highlighting the dire need of the hour, ‘Chart-ing our water future: Eco-nomic frameworks to in-form decision-making’, a report by McKinsey & Company, a global man-agement consulting firm states: “If these “busi-ness-as-usual” trends are
insufficient to close the water gap, the re-sult in many cases could be that fossil re-serves are depleted, water reserved for environmental needs is drained, or—more simply—some of the demand will go un-met, so that the associated economic or social benefits will simply not occur.”
The report further explained: “By 2030, demand in India will grow to almost 1.5
trillion m3, driven by domestic demand for rice, wheat, and sugar for a growing popula-tion, a large proportion of which is moving toward a middle-class diet. Against this demand, India’s cur-rent water supply is ap-proximately 740 billion m3. As a result, most of India’s river basins could face severe deficit by 2030 unless concerted ac-tion is taken.”
Even non-government or-ganisations like Rotary Club of Bombay have involved them-selves in water conservation pro-jects taking into account the dearth of water in Maharashtra and its neigh-bouring states.
President Padmakar Nandeka informs about the 50 water check dams that the organisation has built in places like Ra-jasthan. “We also have a conser-vation project in Thana. Every Holi, we use two tankers of wa-ter but this time we have decid-ed not to go for it considering the issues of our time,” he elaborated.
Corporate lessons in saving water Corporates pitch in to conserve water
Rainwater harvesting for you?
Individual buildings can do their bit by implementing rainwater
harvesting in their premises.
Assuming the average rainfall of 2000 mm for the city, as per the standard expectation an area of 1000 meters (approx. 10,000 Sq. Ft) can become catchment area for almost 20,00,000 litres (twenty lakh litres) ofwater during four months —the entire monsoon season. With this estimate, if each of the buildings starts collecting and saving rainwater falling in their premises or at least start re-charging their own grounds, the city will be rid of water problems at least for the non-potable purposes.
As per the civic estimates, if 70 per cent of the city area is assumed to be developed and 50 per cent of it be roofed and we can collect water falling on it. The quantity of water that can be harvested works out to
589.34 MLD, which will be more than what Middle Vaitarna project will give water to the city. BMC spent Rs 2207 crore for Middle Vaitarna Dam project which is expected to bring 455 MLD water from next year.
JP Bhatt watering his plants using rainwater harvesting system at his residence in Pune
Geeta Desai
In a complete contrast to the central govern-ment’s and state government’s endeavour to pro-vide a toilet to all households in villages across the country, the same government is showing apathy towards providing sanitation facility to metro cit-ies, which need them the most.
Sanitation is not the priority for the govern-ment says Rajeev Kher, MD, Saraplast (Shra-mik). Kher’s company is a sanitation solution provider in urban and rural parts of India. “We are just not providing solution to the situation
but we also provide standard portable solutions with dignity. With this we are also trying to conserve water with minimum usage,” said Kher, who participated in Good & Green con-clave organised by Godrej last week.
Kher feels that effective sanitation planning
in cities and use of portable toilets can also help reduce water wastage. Mobile toilets for large gathering, public rallies and exhibitions are an easy solution, but Kher advocates mobile toilets for slum which will provide easy and cheap solution. Also this will do away with different
permissions and procedures required for the construction of the toilet in the city, which faces paucity of space.
125 billion litres of water is wasted across the world each day. For holistic approach of saving water along with providing dignified solution for the masses, mobile toilets will go long way. “Vacuum suction technology and pour flush technology for disposal of waste from the toilet helps in easy maintenance with less usage of water. While we tend to use five – 10 litres of water for normal flush, in mobile toilets flush-ing needs only 330 Ml – 1 litre water”, said Kher who runs a couple of projects for slums in Pune and a few girls schools. He added that bio-based deodorisers and vinegar or soil based additives for cleaning purpose so that the toilets are envi-ronment friendly.
A thumbs up for mobile loos Mobile toilets can provide sanitation solution to the city and conserve water too
