Common Effluent Treatment Plant at Vapi, G.I.D.C.
Introduction
Vapi GIDC Estate is “Declared Chemical Estate” housing over 1400 industries, two third of which are chemical related units. Almost 80% of the industries belong to Small Scale Sector.
The rapid industrialization was the goal and the national and state economic policy was to encourage SSI sector for maximum employment at minimum capital investment.
The planners could not keep pace with the rapid development and proliferation of SSI sector and many basic provisions so essential for an industrial estate of this kind were left unattended. No provisions for the management of industrial estate were made. As a result of this, by the time the menace of Environmental Pollution came under focus and stringent Pollution Control Acts came into existence, the issue had become complicated. The SSI sector was simply not having adequate technical, financial or human resources to comply with stringent standards required.
CETP Concept & Development
State Government appointed a special High Power Committee to examine all the aspects and recommend a suitable policy to deal with environment protection on one hand and safeguard SSI sector’s existence. The committee concluded that the only viable option under these circumstances was to adopt the concept of Common Effluent Treatment Plant (CETP).
CETP would be viable in an estate like Vapi where a large number of small units were concentrated in a small area. This view was endorsed by VIA and the Government, GIDC and GPCB and a working group was constituted. GIDC was appointed as a Nodal Agency and assigned with the task of building up appropriate facility for waste water treatment.
Based on the feasibility study made by NEERI and the design of Kirloskar Consultants, GIDC has constructed a CETP with the capacity to treat 55 MLD at an estimated cost of Rs. 20 Crores. 40% of the cost was initially contributed by the industries and the remaining amount to be paid to GIDC in 32 quarterly instalments with interest.
Although originally the plant was to be commissioned and operated by GIDC, it decided to hand over this responsibility to the VIA. The Association took up the responsibility and set up a separate company namely Vapi Waste and Effluent Management Company Limited (VWEMCL). Over 600 industrial units became members and are sharing the investment capital cost and treatment expenses in proportion to their volume of water consumption.
