KARACHI, March 17: Participants of a public hearing have criticised the proposed extraction of ground water for production and sale of ‘high quality bottled water’, saying that it will upset the overall aquifer status of the area concerned.

The public hearing of environmental impact assessment for installation of a bottled water plant based on reverse osmosis technology was organised by the Sindh Environmental Protection Agency on Saturday. Director-General of the agency Abdul Malik Ghauri presided over the meeting which was attended by a number of ecology experts, public representatives and area nazims.

The proponent of the proposed water plant said that they would extract about 400 cubic meter of brackish water through wells everyday from a depth of 700-800 feet at a site in Port Qasim Industrial Esate, 2km from shore.

“We will have not to pay against the subsoil water drawing which is likely to be increased in the second phase of the project when expansion works would be undertaken for enhancing the production of bottled water,” said the project manager, adding that some wells have already been prepared to draw the saline feed water from underground sources.

According to project presentation, the process for making the brackish water useable, as chosen by the plant proponents, involve three liquid streams: the saline feed water (brackish water), low salinity product water, and very saline concentrated brine or reject water.

The product water is generally water with less than 500mg per litre dissolved solid, while the brine will be a concentrated salt solution with more than 35,000mg per litre dissolved solids, which in the case of the project will be discharged into the sea.

It was said at the meeting that aside from the need to dispose the brine into the sea, the water plant project had a negligible environmental impact. The brine will be transported to the sea through a ‘kacha’ drain which is already carrying pollutant loaded water to the sea.

Participants feared that the area of Bin Qasim and Malir, already undergoing unbearable environmental degradation, would have to suffer further due to ground water extraction in such large quantity. Some of them suggested that the proponent should transport the water direct from the sea.

Two experts urged the proponent to construct a protected and covered drainage line to shift waste liquids from the plant to some 10 to 12 km deep in the sea in order to avert some environmentally sensitive factors like seepage of hazardous water into the adjacent land. One speaker said that the National Environment Standards did not allow any kind of water, whether treated or non-treated to the sea and the matter be taken up seriously.

However, one of the proponent’s representatives said that the underground water planned to be taken out for bottling was at present in no way being used for any human purpose and lying untapped and as such the apprehension about depletion of aquifer was unjustified.

He further said that if they went for drawing the water direct from the sea the project would not remain commercially viable.

Coming to discharge of rejected water he said that the concentration of waste water would dilute further when it would mix with other effluents in the 2km channel already transporting domestic and industrial waste water, and as such the TDS of the plant effluent would be less than that of the receiving body, the sea.