Back in 2016, Centre for Ecological Sciences (CES) of Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, figured a way for the IT hub to stay water surplus. On an average, 20.05 TMC (thousand million cubic feet) of water is required every year for domestic purposes, CES’s technical report established.
Of which about 16.04 TMC, about 80 percent, could be met just by treating sewage water, suggested the report. Add to this, the rain yield, which is about 14.80TMC a year and Bengaluru could easily meet its water needs, the report stated.
S Vishwanath, Bengaluru’s go-to man for water conservancy and director of Biome Environmental Solutions is a long-time advocate of treated wastewater for drinking. According to him, it is now all in the mind, as science has already shown that it is perfectly fine to drink treated wastewater.
Little over 10 days ago, investment whiz Nithin Kamath, founder and CEO of Zerodha and Rainmatter Foundation, propped up Boson White Water, a Bengaluru-based firm that converts wastewater into potable water, stating that wastewater could be the part of the solution for Bengaluru’s water shortage crisis, on X. Although some agreed with him, most were revulsed by the idea of drinking water that was once sewage.
Replying to Kamath, people started saying, without any scientific backing, that treated water will have heavy metals or hormones and therefore is unfit for consumption. The concern also stemmed from the perception that sewage treatment plants are run in a very bad way.
In the Biome report, the farmers that the researchers spoke to had confirmed that contrary to the negative assumptions earlier, which had delayed the project, they found that the effort had rejuvenated the depleted groundwater and that most are finding groundwater at 300 to 400 feet. Earlier it was difficult to find water even at 1,200 feet, they said, adding that they often dug between two to four borewells, due to previous ones failing to yield water.
“In India, one estimate suggests that treated wastewater can annually irrigate about 1 to 1.5million hectares of land…. But, this is the only way forward for us to cut down our dependence on rain. I also think if people start getting comfortable with non-potable uses, potable will follow. It’s only a matter of time,” said Viswanath.
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