Water supply projects launched in Saurashtra

May 5, 2012

The state government on Friday said that it had launched an ambitious project to prevent the Narmada water from flowing into the sea, and to supply one million acre feet of water each to the parched areas of Saurashtra, Kutch and North Gujarat.

Chief Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Rs139 crore 32-km long water pipeline connecting Navda with Botad in Bhavnagar on Friday. He also performed groundbreaking ceremony of the projects to fill the Krishnasagar and Kaniad lakes and the pipeline projects of Goma and Sukhbhadar dams.

Modi said that the government had embarked on a major plan to fill the 77 dams as well as other water bodies in Saurashtra with Narmada water. He said that cost of the project would be more than the cost of Narmada project.

Modi used the occasion to lash out at the Congress-led UPA government for its anti-farmer policies. He said that country’s Capital New Delhi continued to face power issues, while even villages in Gujarat were getting round the clock power supply.

“Gujarat is willing to supply power to Delhi, but the Congress government does not have the transmission lines to do so,” he said.

Water supply and water resources minister Nitin Patel said that earlier drinking water was supplied in Saurashtra through trains, but this was not the case any more. He said that water availability had also led to higher agricultural output.

CSMCRI to set up TFC RO membrane mfg plant

BHAVNAGAR: Safe and clean water would be much cheaper now as Bhavnagar's Central Salt and Marine Chemicals Research Institute (CSMCRI) is going to set up a plant in Bhavnagar.

The 2,000 sqm/day thin film composite (TFC) reverse osmosis (RO) membrane and spiral modules manufacturing plant will come up in Chitra Industrial Estate here in Bhavnagar.

New Delhi-based Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) sanctioned the project to CSMCRI, which is one of the constituent laboratories of CSIR.

According to Dr P K Ghosh, director, CSMCRI, "Rs 24 crore will be spent for the project. It will be first of its kind in the country.''

"The desalination plants that are installed in the country so far are based on imported RO membrane. But CSMCRI has developed a world-class technology for desalination of brackish and sea water for producing clean water with the help of thin film composite (TFC) reverse osmosis (RO) membrane manufacturing technology in the country. The membranes made from this facility will be utilized for CSIR-800 programme, societal mission activities and other government-funded projects for meeting the drinking water demand. The facility can showcase the indigenous membrane technology and will facilitate transfer of the technology to prospective entrepreneurs for large-scale production. Commercialization of the indigenously developed TFC RO membrane technology will have a great impact in meeting the demand of water in the country in future for both human consumption as well as for industry,'' Ghosh added.

He said that they expect utilization of the indigenously made membranes to reduce overall production cost and have high socio-economic relevance in terms of environmental safety, water treatment and reclamation and other industrial applications.

"The technology that we have developed will not only desalinate sea water but also all others impurities in the water making it safer and cleaner for drinking. Moreover, in a country, where the population is on a rise everyday and which depends on rain water, we need to have this kind of technology to solve our drinking water problems which are going to be serious in the coming years. Based on indigenous membrane technology, CSIR-CSMCRI has set up about 80 RO desalination plants in the country as well as overseas," Ghosh added.

According to A V R Reddy, principal scientist, (reverse osmosis membrane), CSMCRI, TFC membrane preparation is a complex process that requires sound understanding of the influence of different process variables on performance and a high degree of precision-based technology. There are only a few companies in the US and Japan which have so far been able to master this type of technology for desalination''.