Pilot project to carry treated sewage water through new pipeline nearing completion.
The residents of Hebbal valley can breathe easy after three months when a separate pipeline will carry treated sewage water into the water bodies there.
If the project, first of its kind to be tried in the city, proves to be a success, it will be implemented in other valleys too.
The Rs45-crore zero discharge scheme taken up by the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) will become operational once the last 1km stretch of the new pipeline is completed.
Right now, the valley’s storm water drain, which is supposed to carry only rain water, was taking untreated sewage straight into water bodies polluting them and the air.
While this caused health problems for residents of the valley, civic agencies did not have the facility to treat the water and make it usable.
According to BWSSB’s project report, the extensive sewerage system was provided in 1974 and 1982 in the core city area. Trunk sewers in the core area ran up to 243 km of which about 80 km of pipelines passed through storm water drains of valleys.
Due to continuous usage over the years, the existing sewerage system is not functioning properly. Other causes for its weak functioning include encroachments over sewers lines, reduction in the carrying capacity of sewers due to overload, silt in sewer lines and damage caused to sewer lines running into storm water drains.
The BWSSB found it difficult to carry the entire waste water generated to sewage treatment plants before it gets discharged into nearby lakes and water bodies.
Hence, it proposed to divert the 80 km trunk sewers running into storm water drains to another designated line to prevent damage to sewers and obstruction in sewage flow.
Since the pipeline work for the 80 km stretch will cost heavily, BWSSB proposed to implement the zero discharge system as a pilot project in the storm water drains in Hebbal Valley .
Under the scheme, 9 km of trunk sewers will be laid outside the storm water drains and 15 km of damaged or defunct sewers will be replaced.
The trunk sewer system runs up to 43 km in the Hebbal drainage zone.
Interestingly, when the BWSSB approached the Bangalore Development Authority and Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike for contributions, their response was not encouraging.
“Subsequently, this scheme was posed to Karnataka Urban Infrastructure Development and Finance Corporation to be included under the megacity project. As per the request made by the board, the project was cleared by the corporation under megacity revolving funds for 50 per cent of the project cost as loan. The scheme has been divided into five packages,” a BWSSB officer, requesting anonymity, said.
BWSSB chief engineer Basavaraj said the work would be completed in three months.
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