Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Government approves India's First Bio Remediation project for Buddha Nala, Ludhiana

This project, one of the first of its kind, will employ the use of
microbes to eat away the waste component of effluents that are
discharged into the Buddha Nala, Ludhiana. In effect, the microbial
consortia applied in the technology will 'chew away' the organic load
and industrial pollutants leaving behind the clean water. The visible
impact of this technology is expected to become manifest in a period
of 3 months. Funded entirely by the NRCD, Ministry of Environment and
Forests, it aims to reduce the effluent/ sewage load in the water by
upto 40%.


Following the invitation of Member of Parliament (Ludhiana) Mr.
Manish Tewari, the Hon’ble Minister for Environment and Forests Mr.
Jairam Ramesh along with officials of the Ministry of Environment and
Forests including the Chairman of the Central Pollution Control
Board, visited the site of the Buddha Nala in Ludhiana Punjab in
September of 2010. During his visit, he was taken on an inspection of
the Nala and was made aware of the debilitating and overwhelming
degree to which the Nala had been polluted due to the presence of
untreated waste.

Thereafter the Hon’ble Minister ordered site studies to be undertaken
and a proposal for an ‘In Situ Bio-Remediation Project’ was drawn up.
This revolutionary method, which has been used with great success
worldwide, employs the use of microbes to eat away the waste component
of effluents that are discharged into the water.

This ‘In Situ Bio-Remediation’ project will tackle the effluent load
of industrial and domestic waste being emptied out into the Buddha
Nala. By erecting ‘Green bridges’, i.e. temporary barricades fortified
with microbial consortia, the MoEF will attempt to build filters
through which the untreated waters may pass.

With every successive Green Bridge that the water passes through there
will be an expected reduction in
what is known as ‘Bio-chemical oxygen demand’ (BoD) and ‘Chemical
oxidation demand’ (CoD) levels. These Green bridges will be at set up
intervals of 1 Km each or as mandated by the flow and quantum of water
found in the Nala.

In effect, the microbial consortia applied in the technology will
‘chew away’ the
organic load and industrial pollutants leaving behind only the clean
water. The
visible impact and benefit of this technology is expected to become
manifest in a
period of three months. The MoEF expects the BoD load to be reduced by upto 40%
along with an apparent reduction of the surrounding odour.

The microbial consortia deployed in the use of this technology are
harmless and
indigenously found in nature. No genetically modified organisms would
be used in
the execution of this project. This is an environmentally benign
process that has no
harmful impact on the surrounding ecosystem including on human or animal health.

It may also be noted that Buddha Nala represents the largest project of this
magnitude undertaken in the country. The cost of the entire project
will be borne by
the National River Conservation Directorate, Ministry of Environment
and Forests,
Government of India.

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