By Yogesh Pokharel

Foul-smelling human wastes and drainage can be turned into useful biogas, manure and water for use in homes, the people in Shreekhandapur in Dhulikhel municipality have proved this.
Locals of this beautiful municipality are now enjoying benefits out of the drain and waste that was a headache for them until a few months ago.

The municipality has installed a wastewater treatment plant, which aims at benefiting more than 3,000 of its people. Various organizations agreed to establish the plant in hopes that other small towns could replicate it. This all has been possible due to the Asian Development Bank funded Urban and Environment Improvement Project (UEIP).
"The treatment plant has manifold advantages to the community and the area. It is environment friendly; it gives nearly two cylinders of biogas everyday; it yields high-quality compost manure for our crops; and last but not the least, it helps keep our holy rivers and rivulets sacred and clean," said Rajesh Manandhar, coordinator of Water and Sanitation Department at UN-HABITAT Water for Asian Cities Programme.
In technical jargons, a Community Based Wastewater Treatment Plant of Reed Bed Treatment System (RBTS) connects a biogas reactor having capacity of 150-cubic metre at Shreekhandapur in Ward No. 9 of the municipality. The system has been established with the technical support of the Environment and Public Health Organization (ENPHO) and the financial support of the UN-HABITAT Water for Asian Cities Programme Nepal. The present discharge is at 103 cubic metres, but the total capacity in design was 205 cubic metres per day, sources said.
Purna Bahadur Karmacharya, chairperson of the Shreekhandapur Wastewater Treatment Plant User’s Committee (SWTPUC), said that the work had already completed and the production of biogas had started from this month.
"It is better than the LPG cooking gas, and quite amazingly it lights up better than that," he said.
He said that they had distributed the produced gas to five households for the first time and gradually they increased the number of households with the increase in the production of gas. "Now, the gas is supplied to the households in the vicinity at a reasonable price, i.e. Rs. 350 per household as it is a trial phase," he said adding that they would increase the tariff in the days to come.
The plant was expected to produce approximately 150 cubic meter of biogas per day.
The revenue collected from the consumers will be used for the operation and maintenance of the treatment plant," he said.
According to him, the sewer line from around 200 households of Shreekhandapur has been connected to RBT for wastewater treatment.
The users’ committee played a crucial role in installing the plant, Karmacharya said. "When the sewage was directly diverged towards the river, it had created several hazards, creating problems to the environment and health."
The treated water would be pure enough to use in the bathrooms to flush toilets and irrigate in the kitchen gardens, said Dr. Roshan Raj Shrestha, chief technical advisor, UN-HABITAT. "Once installed, it works for 2 to 3 decades, only carrying out minor repairs," he added. He said that the treatment plant would also be supportive in increasing agricultural productivity as the sludge from the reactor would be used as fertilizer.
Hari Gopal Pradhananga, secretary, SWTPUC, said that they were about to add more wastes from near by. "There are nearly 2000 students in Kathmandu University and we are on the way to talk to them for their wastes," he said.
"The wastewater generated from Shreekhandapur was being directly discharged into the nearby river in the past, which was causing river pollution, affecting public health. The problem has been solved after the construction of this treatment plant. Human excreta from the wastewater will be separated from liquor waste, which will be passed to two biogas reactors to generate biogas," said Pradhananga.
Manandhar foresees the sustainability of the programme as the main challenge. "There is no debate that programme is praiseworthy, but the main point is its sustainability," he said.
The liquid waste is sent to ‘Reed Bed Treatment Plant’ for further treatment. The plant consists of a flow diversion manhole, a coarse screen and grit chamber, two diversion chambers, two 75 cubic-metre biogas reactors, six horizontal reed-bed plants, two sludge drying beds and 11 collection manholes. The treated water then discharged into the river.
The users’ committee has been provided four ropanis of land worth US$ 26,000 by the municipality and the UN-HABITAT, provided $90,000 financial support for the construction. Government of Nepal, under funding of Asian Development Bank, has implemented Urban and Environment Improvement Project (UEIP) in eight growth nodes cities surrounding Kathmandu valley to address the environmental degradation issues caused by rapid urban population growth in Nepal and Dhulikhel Municipality is one of these.
The government should conduct further research on the effectiveness and efficiency of this programme to improve the technology for its replication in other places as well.

Source: The Rising Nepal, 10 July 2009