Daily Times

KARACHI: The citizens of Karachi are being supplied 420 million gallons of water per day (MGD) without any treatment through Karachi Water and Sewerage Board (KWSB) water trunk mains, officials of water entity revealed.

The existing working filtration capacity currently available is 50 MGD from Pipri Filter Plant, 100 MGD from North East Karachi (NEK) K-II Filter Plant and 80 MGD from Hub Filter Plant, they maintained.

The four filter plants-Gharo, Hills, Pipri old and NEK old with total capacity of 210 MGD filtration remained non-functional due to lack of maintenance facilities, official of KWSB added.

The potable water being supplied to Karachi lacks in maintaining the quality as per World Health Organization (WHO) standards.

“One of the major reasons behind this cumbersome situation can be attributed to the economical life of these plants, built two and more than two decades back have completed their life and lack of maintenance have also resulted in the deplorable condition of these plants”, Hashim Raza Zaidi, Managing Director KWSB asserted.

A proposal has been put up to the government to increase filtration capacity of these plants and construction of new filter plants based on the total quantity of water, which is being supplied to Karachiites, he said.

The total package of filter plants will include the laboratories at all filter plants and training is being made compulsory and all the pre-requisites regarding maintaining the quality of water is being included in rehabilitation and construction of new filter plant, Zaidi added.

A committee has already started its work and visited all filter plants including laboratories to asses the present condition, he informed.

There are proposals for building seven new filter plants besides rehabilitation of four plants with a financial implication involve in implementing the project of Rs 3,500 million.

The new filter plants are planned at Gharo with a capacity of 10 MGD, Pipri 30 MGD, Dumlottee interconnection 15 MGD, NEK K-2 new 10 MGD, NEK K-3 old 75 MGD, COD 50 MGD and Hub filter plant with a capacity of 20 MGD.

After the rehabilitation of the existing filtration plants and construction of new filter plant the filtration capacity will be increased by 420 MGD and thus total capacity of 650 MGD will be filtered according to WHO standards.

The chlorinators at COD (70 MGD) and Hub Filter Plant have been made functional. Laboratory staff needs training and equipment to assess the quality of raw and filtered water. General observation is that filter media needs replacement and cleaning of clarifiers, filter beds, back wash system act including piping and electrical works, he opined.