When one of the major consumers of fresh water — Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Ltd. (MRPL) — is making heightened efforts to curb such usage, the company is unable to get the required quantity of treated domestic sewage as an alternative.
At a time when water scarcity is looming over the coastal city, MRPL is equipped to meet at least half of its water requirement through treated sewage. It uses approximately 13 million gallons per day (MGD) water — about 9 MGD of fresh water, 3 MGD from the Kavoor Sewage Treatment Plant (STP) and 2 MGD through internal water recycling. The plant is designed to use about 7 MGD treated sewage.
On the other hand, though the four STPs in different parts of the city have an installed capacity to treat about 18 MGD of sewage, only about 5-6 MGD flow through them even as the Surathkal STP is yet to become operational. There are suspicions that half of the sewage generated is let into storm-water drains, which once were fresh water streams. All the 3 MGD treated sewage from Kavoor STP is lifted by MRPL while another 2 MGD treated sewage from the Jeppinamogaru plant is let into the Netravathi for want of a pipeline to Kavoor and 0.21 MGD treated sewage from the Pachchanadi STP is used by the Pilikula Biological Park. Residents of Mangaluru use an estimated 27 MGD Netravathi water, though about 36 MGD is actually pumped from the Thumbe vented dam. The remaining 9 MGD is lost either due to theft or leakage.
Designed to use sewage
MRPL Director (Refinery) M. Venkatesh told The Hindu that the first two phases of the plant had been using 6 MGD fresh water. While planning Phase 3 of MRPL, it was so designed that half of the water requirement of all three phases (about 13 MGD) should be met through treated sewage. Accordingly, MRPL now can use up to 7 MGD treated domestic sewage. The company also got installed a skid-mounted reverse osmosis water purifying plant recently as the treated sewage had high potassium content, particularly during summer.
Mr. Venkatesh said that MRPL is awaiting completion of a pipeline from Jeppinamogaru STP to Kavoor STP by Mangalore Special Economic Zone so that it gets at least 2 MGD more treated sewage.
