Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Mar 8: Urban development minister, Roshan Baig, stated that the state government has been considering the viability of processing seawater at Udupi and Mangaluru and other coastal areas for pumping the same by using Yettinahole pipeline to supply water to drought-hit Kolar region. He hoped that the recently unveiled low cost system of processing of seawater to make it potable becomes successful, as the success of the proposed plan entirely depends on cost effectiveness of this method.

"The state government has evinced keen interest in the technology to transform sea water into drinking water through processing. We have been making efforts at different levels. We understand that an experiment on this was made near Minjur, Tamil Nadu where 100 million litres of water being processed by the new method has become successful," he explained. Baig added that the government contemplates setting up seawater processing units in Udupi, Mangaluru and Uttara Kannada regions, and that already discussions have been held with several companies on this issue.

The minister noted that these processing units do not need large tracts of land. "To ease pressure on the city, we have a plan to build a township, 'Navanagar' with private partnership at Kolar Gold Fields in about 11,000 acres of land on the lines of 'Amaravathi' city being built in Andhra Pradesh. This township, as per current plan, will house a population of 20 lac. For this city, we plan to bring processed seawater from coastal Karnataka. We will also obtain feasibility reports about alternative methods to bring water to this region in addition to the said scheme," he explained.