Various environmental engineering experts have stressed the need for capacity augmentation of the 15-year-old sewage treatment plant (STP) at Pampa on a war-footing.
The existing chemical-based STP at Pampa with a capacity to treat 3.5 million litres of sewage a day is grossly inadequate to meet the sewage treatment demand at Sabarimala, experts say.
Experts say that a complete biological sewage treatment system is unlikely to yield the desired results at Pampa. A total biological system will not work at Pampa owing to the presence of chemicals and other anti-bacterial agents in the sewage.
The High Power Committee for the implementation of the Sabarimala Master Plan is planning to demolish the existing STP at Pampa and construct a 5 mld biological STP there.
This would only lead to total chaos in sewage treatment as a large number of pilgrims visit Sabarimala during Onam and Vishu and during the five-day rituals every month. Stopping STP functioning during the period would increase pollution of the Pampa and the environment.
In his inspection report of December 27, 2014, Ajith Haridas, head of the Process Engineering and Environmental Technology Division at the National Institute for Interdisciplinary Science and Technology in Thiruvananthapuram, has stated that the Pampa STP was overloaded.
The Kerala State Pollution Control Board too has recommended capacity augmentation of the STP at Pampa,
