Bengalureans to gain 25 million litres of water if BWSSB upgrades its pumps

BENGALURU: Without any capital investment on the part of Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB), the city stands to gain an additional 25 million litres of water per day if the detailed plan to upgrade its mammoth pumps is implemented.

This will also help in reducing the board’s monthly electricity bills by Rs 1.25 crore. Instead of the Board investing the capital, the plan is to hand over the modernisation job to a private firm. “When the pumps are modernised, BWSSB stands to save `20 crore a month on energy bills and `8 crore on maintenance costs. It is this `28 crore saved annually that will be handed over to the private firm for a period of 10 years as a return for the investment made by them,” a senior official said. 

The Rs 200-crore proposal, which is awaiting approval from its Board members, looks at modernising the nine mammoth pumps used in Cauvery Water Supply Scheme (CWSS) Stage I, II and III. These pumps at Thoraikandanahalli, Harohalli and Tataguni pumping stations ensure the city is supplied water daily from a distance of nearly 100km.“Due to massive leaks, flash outages and sudden failure of pumps, BWSSB sometimes encounters major problems in despatching water to the city. Restarting them after repairs also results in a surge in power consumption,” a senior official said.

Presently, the Board spends nearly `45 lakh a month in maintaining these pumps. Pumps of the first stage are as old as 1973, the year the first phase was commissioned. “Leaks naturally happen due to wear and tear. In addition, the efficiency in pumping is not forceful due to the age factor,” a senior official said.
While Stage II was commissioned in 1983, the third stage was commissioned in 1993. The three stages supply 600 MLD of water per day to the city.

Apart from replacement of pumps, all the electromechanical unit motors, beakers and cables of all the pumps will also be replaced so that the pumping stations in these three stages are brought on par with the hugely efficient ones of CWSS Stage IV Phase I and II, the official said.An audit report carried out by an independent firm for BWSSB last year revealed that while the efficiency of the first three stages ranges between 75 per cent and 80 per cent, Stage IV had an efficiency of 86 per cent. The additional 25 MLD water per day would be an outcome of efficient pumps as well as no leakages due to new equipments. 

“The efficient management of critical pumping machinery will reduce energy consumption. The electricity bills would go down by 6 per cent,” he added. BWSSB presently spends `33 crore a month on power, another official pointed out. There is no expense for BWSSB in this scheme and it stands to gain a 100 per cent reliable system, the plan suggests.