The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has asked the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research-National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI) to speed up the feasibility study on the development of the process package treatment method to check pollution of the Pallikkalar stretch in Karunagapally, and Edappally and Perandoor canals in Kochi.
The Southern Bench of the tribunal made the recommendation after the Environment department informed that the CSIR-NEERI may require 15 months to prepare the feasibility report. The Kerala State Pollution Control Board (PCB) had sanctioned ₹45 lakh to conduct the study, which is aimed at checking indiscriminate faecal contamination of waterbodies owing to dumping of untreated wastewater.
“Though it is felt that the duration of 15 months will be a little longer for such a project, we recommend that NEERI reduce the length of the period, so that the same model can be extended to other places where there is no underground sewage system,” it said.
The package treatment method involves sewage treatment through physical, chemical and biological processes to remove physical, chemical and biological pollutants/contaminants. A two-member team of scientists from the institute had conducted a site assessment on select polluted stretches in Ernakulam, Alappuzha, and Thiruvananthapuram in the second week of May this year on a directive from the tribunal.
The Bench had asked the State government to implement temporary measures such as phytorid wastewater treatment technology proposed by NEERI, while stating that projects to rejuvenate canals could not be kept pending forever.
