Wastewater Treatment and Recycling – Challenges and Opportunities
Name of the Speaker: Dr. Lakshminarayana Rao
Title of the Seminar: Wastewater Treatment and Recycling – Challenges and Opportunities
Date and Time: 30 Nov 2021 (Thursday), 4:00pm
Online Platform: MS Teams [link to the video of the seminar]
About the Speaker: Dr. Lakshminarayana Rao is a chemical engineer by training, has a PhD from McGill University, Montreal Canada and is currently working as a assistant professor at Centre for Sustainable Technologies, at IISc, Bangalore India. Prior to joining IISc, Dr. Rao has worked in Industry for 10 years. His research interests are in the field of cold plasma technology, and advanced oxidation for wastewater treatment and recycling. To date Dr. Rao has authored over 60 international journal articles and conference papers and has six granted US patents in the field of plasma technology and its application.
Abstract: Using freshwater for toilet flushing is a luxury humans cannot afford anymore. With increasing population, climate change and expanding pressures on water resources, much of the world faces a major water crisis. Globally, water shortages are estimated to affect more than 4 billion people annually. India occupies only 2.4 % of the world’s total land area yet supports over 17.5 % of the global population. The total freshwater resource of the country is only 4% of the world’s total utilizable water resource, which is disproportionately low for the current population. In India, over 600 million people face high to extreme water scarcity, with water contamination estimated to impact as much as 70 % of the country’s utilizable water resource. Rural areas face the twin challenges of water scarcity and risk of groundwater contamination due to lack of water treatment options. In this presentation, I will discuss about the design and field implantation of decentralized wastewater treatment system for a rural community. The challenges and opportunities at operating such stand-alone system will be discussed. Also, in this task I will present how cities can become a perennial source of treated water for neighbouring villages. The challenges, opportunities and threats of a large scale (440 MLD) treated water recycling scheme will be discussed.
Date/Time
Date(s) - 30/11/2021
4:00 pm
