UAE | Environment

Towards clean technology

Earthworms will do away with the sewage of one school in Sharjah in an initiative to introduce clean technology to the emirate and produce treated water clean enough for irrigation and district cooling.

  • By Emmanuelle Landais, Staff Reporter
  • Published: 23:47 August 30, 2008
  • Gulf News

  • The Soil Bio-Technology plants work underground to process sewage through layers of soil and stones mixed in with earthworms and bacteria. The surface plant is invisible under gardens or playing fields.
  • Image Credit: Supplied Picture

Dubai: Earthworms will do away with the sewage of one school in Sharjah in an initiative to introduce clean technology to the emirate and produce treated water clean enough for irrigation and district cooling.

Soil Bio-Technology (SBT) for sewage treatment is reportedly 70 per cent less energy intensive, minimal on mechanisation, and operating costs are 40 per cent cheaper compared to conventional options.

Sewage filters through layers of soil and bacteria to be cleaned, and comes out as treated waste water.

Sharjah Municipality is currently testing the water quality of SBT, which is widely used in India.

A small Sharjah-based school has already taken the leap and placed an order to have a 200-cubic metre capacity plant.

A Sharjah hotel and a labour accommodation site are also planning SBT plants in the near future.

No machinery

The plant works by processing organic waste water or sewage, in an eco-system consisting of soil, bacterial culture and earthworms, according to the Pinnacle Knowledge Group who are bringing the technology here.

"The plant uses no machinery so there is no power consumption. There are no chemicals just a soil and stone mix, bacteria and earthworms," said Satish Meena, executive director of Pinnacle Knowledge Group.

Soil Bio-Technology (SBT) has been developed and patented by IIT Bombay for the processing of sewage and waste water.

It is based on the principles of terrestrial ecology, and is both green and sustainable, according to Meena.

"Soil has the innate ability to process organic and inorganic waste.

"SBT is an engineered soil bio-reactor that achieves significantly higher rates of waste processing than soil in its natural state," he said.

The school plant will have 25 to 35 tonnes of soil. The plants are underground and the top can be cultivated. The water is collected through a discharge line and can irrigate sports fields or be sold.

SBT is implemented in 20 sites in India and some of the benefits include no start-up or shut-down costs, silent operation and the chemical free process. According to Meena the process is smell-free and eco-friendly. The water can be reused for multiple applications like agriculture or gardening, construction and toilet flushing.

The area of the plant is calculated by allocating three square metres of space for one cubic metres of sewage per day.

"For larger capacity plants we may be able to achieve further space economy," Meena said.

Website on recycling

Recycle for London is a website dedicated to helping people living in the city to increase their recycling output. It offers tips and techniques that can be used as a starting point for people to "starve their bins."

According to the website, Londoners produce 3.4 million tonnes of rubbish a year but recycle only 25 per cent of that. Recent research has revealed around 60 per cent could be recycled on average per household.

So Recycle for London has made its mission to inform people living in the city what they can do to reduce their waste levels by providing them with locations of various recycling centres.

Tips

To find out whether there is a centre near them, users simply key in their postcode address in the website's search engine.

There are also tips that anyone can follow on whether items such as glass, cardboard, refrigerators and batteries can be recycled. It also has sections that people can use to discover how knowledgeable they are about recycling.

- Compiled by Nathalie Farah/ Community Journalist

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