BARC shows the way to clean up the Ganga

MYSURU: With the Centre taking multiple measures to fulfill its Clean Ganga mission, the country's premier atomic research body, Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) has offered membrane based water treatment system to clean the river.

The department of atomic energy (DAE) in its presentation at the ongoing Indian Science Congress here gave details of the system on Monday, saying how the BARC is already providing technical support to the Jharkhand government for using this effective system to clean the holy Shiv-Ganga pond at Deogarh which attracts millions of devotees every year.

The membrane-based technology helps remove heavy metals from water in rivers, reservoirs or ponds.Usually, heavy metals like chromium, arsenic, cadmium and lead cannot be treated using the conventional water treatment processes.

This system has greater removal performance as a result of increased solid capture and long solid retention times inherent in the mem brane bio-reactor process.

The new technology can be used in the stretch of the river where it gets industrial and municipal discharge in abundance as merely setting up conventional sewage treatment plants (STPs) and Central Ef fluent Treatment Plants (CETPs) are not enough. At present, 764 in dustrial units are located along the Ganga.

The BARC has also developed aerobic and non-aerobic digesters for treatment of various types of wastes, including kitchen and abattoir.This solid waste processing technology is called `Nisargruna` (repaying Nature's loan).