HYDERABAD: As many of the Private Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs) installed in hospitals, gated communities, apartments, big hotels, and office buildings have not been giving the desired results, the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWS&SB) and Administrative Staff College of India (ASCI) will carry out performance evaluation and annual audit of private STPs for all the consumers having a private STPs in their premises from February.
It is estimated that Hyderabad Urban Agglomerate (HUA) has 1,000 private decentralised STPs installed in their premises with an estimated installed capacity of about 150 to 200 MLD. The STP auditing which will start from February and will continue for next three to four months. The audit of private STPs will be conducted once in six months. The decision to audit the STPs was taken as per the directions of the MAUD Minister K T Rama Rao.
Trained personnel from NGOs and ASCI will visit private STP sites and collect data and samples and deposit the same at ASCI, Lab for wastewater analysis. ASCI will undertake the quality assurance by periodically visiting the STPs and collecting, analysing five per cent of samples as third party validation.
The State government is spending a whopping Rs 3,866 crore for constructing 31 STPs in the city with the sole aim to treat sewage. Once completed, Hyderabad will become the only city in the country to have a capacity to treat 100 per cent sewerage water. At present, the city has STPs to treat 772 MLDs which accounts for just 46.75 per cent of total sewerage water produced. The new STPs will create additional capacity to treat 1,260 MLD.
While the government is working towards addressing environmental concerns, the Minister felt that it is necessary to check private STPs installed in hospitals, gated communities, apartments, big hotels and office buildings. Also, HMWS&SB is giving one-third (1/3) concession on sewage cess from the total 33 per cent cess collected in the water bill to those having private STPs.
Sources said that audit of private STPs through NGOs will be implemented. Development of ICT-based tools for data collection by ASCI, short-listing of NGOs for data collection and accredited labs for wastewater analysis will be done by ASCI.