Worried over the increasing water bill of your apartment?
Water management experts have come up with a slew of suggestions, including replacement of single flush cisterns with dual flush cisterns and separate treatment facility for kitchen sullage and recycled water for apartment complexes, following a water audit in one of the apartment complexes in the city.
The audit was conducted at the Nagarjuna Pearl Bay Apartments Kadavanthra by the Centre for Sustainable Water Technology and Management of the SCMS School of Engineering and Technology, Karukutty, Ernakulam. Of the 208 apartments in the project, 185 were occupied and they together housed 740 residents.
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Analysis of the water usage expenses of residents revealed that toilet flushes required 165 litres a day followed by bathing (100 litres), washing clothes and kitchen needs (60 litres each) and floor and toilet cleaning (40 litre). The bore-well, which met the daily water demand of the residents in 2009, could meet only 15 per cent of the requirements during the audit period.
The declining yield from bore wells, the major water source, had forced the residents to dig three more wells. While two of them failed, the water from the third one had high iron content. The limited supply of drinking water from the Kerala Water Authority forced them to depend heavily on the tanker lorries. The residents had to purchase around 75,000 litres a day from water suppliers, which forced them to take a look at their consumption patterns to achieve efficiency and realistic water savings.
The residents also had roof top system for collecting rainwater from the roof, which was then routed to underground water storage tank. Pressure sand filter, iron filter, Reverse Osmosis unit for purifying water from bore well and a chlorination unit was operated at the apartment complex.
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Toilet flushes of 10 litre capacity shall be replaced with 3/6 litres or 2/4 litres dual flush cisterns. Separate treatment facility for kitchen sullage and recycled water, proper utilisation of the collection tank for storing maximum water supplied by the KWA, use of cheap source of water for car wash instead of water from Reverse Osmosis plant and awareness on the economics of water saving were some of the suggestions given by the experts.
According to Sunny George, head of the centre, the findings hold good for all the residential and commercial units in the city.
Introduction of scientific and management measures could bring in qualitative and quantitative changes in the water consumption, suggested Dr. George.