Sewage to potable water: IIT-Kgp alumni comes up with water recycling plant
Kolkata: IIT Kharagpur is setting up the Aditya Choubey Center for Re-Water Research, seed-funded by its two alumni Anant Choubey and Aneesh Reddy to remediate, replenish and rejuvenate water resources.
"The scarcity of water, both for domestic and drinking purposes, is becoming acute and will only worsen in the coming years. On the other hand, urban areas are witnessing massive sewage problems. The idea of linking these two crises and coming up with one viable solution was challenging. Having done that, we would be networking with government bodies to take up this technology and the process and meet the water challenge in various cities," said Aneesh Reddy.
The Centre will come up with an on-campus plant which will daily convert 1.35 million litre of sewage water from the hostels to 1.2 million litre of potable water.
The pilot plant at the institute is expected to be ready by March 2019. The MoU was signed on Friday in presence of both the alumni on the occasion of 68th Foundation Day of the institute.
The water processing and output will be monitored in real-time and conform to IS 10500-2012 standard for drinking water.
"We will conduct quality assurance tests demonstrating the suitability of the technology for treatment of sewage and consumption and infuse confidence among agencies and the public at large related to water supply and treatment," said Prof M M Ghangrekar, faculty at the Dept. of Civil Engineering who will be heading this project. The researchers would also develop an operationally viable technology so that the plant can be profitably commercialized.
According to Partha Pratim Chakrabarti, director, IIT KGP, the step is geared towards the challenge taken up by the institute to resolve two burning issues of urban India — sewage disposal and access to clean potable water.
"We are looking forward to participatory models in villages to implement this technology. We would also engage international water experts and professionals from the industry as researchers and advisors in this Center. Aneesh and Anant will be advisers as well," he said.
