It can save our already scarce water resources, help keep our seas clean and marine pollution at bay

Report: Sarpreet Kaur

Port Blair, Feb 28: The modern world is known for its umpteen miracles performed with the aid of technology. However, when it comes to solid waste management, even these miracles have not been able to cope up with the ever-increasing population and corresponding waste accumulation. Many highly useful but still inadequate strides towards the goal of managing the solid waste in water have been taken but it doesn’t always take a miracle to solve a problem. Sometimes a simple NET is enough.

Something like this happened in the Australian city of Kwinana where the local administration experimented with drainage nets or so-called “trash traps” by installing them on the one end of drainage pipes which were the exit point of dump into the natural resources of the city. The size of drainage pipe outlets was 750mm and 450mm diameter.  In a matter of six months, they were able to shunt out 370 kg of the trash mainly plastic from the water and saved their natural resources as well as aquatic life from degradation. These traps are easy to use and can be removed using simple cranes.

It is cost-effective, environmentally friendly and quite a manageable solution to a significant environmental hazard. It also helped to dial down the numbers of laborers involved in the inhumane practice of manual scavenging and provide dignity of life to many.

Globally used sewage treatment is a process of eradicating harmful substances from the used water employing physical, chemical and biological processes. This treatment aims to treat the water to reduce the contamination and bring it to acceptable levels before its release into the environment. Even after strict policies of sewage treatments at the hotels and lodges, the sheer amount of garbage that it consists has made it difficult to handle. Slurry a byproduct of sewage treatment is in itself a big problem.

This simple invention which worked wonders in garbage management and in saving natural resources in a small city in Australia has opened doors of innovation for many other places. Likewise in our city, Port Blair which stands on highly eco-sensitive grounds with meager drinking water resources dependent completely on annual rainfall can benefit a lot from such a solution. The nets can be installed outside houses, hotels, lodges and even big corporations.

These cost effect net traps can help us provide a simple yet effective solution to ever-increasing garbage dumping either seeping in our drinking water or adding up to the marine pollution and hindering marine life.