ICLEI – South Asia organised an exposure visit for the officials of Solapur Municipal Corporation (SMC) to Nagpur city under the project on Integrated Rural Urban Water Management for Climate Based Adaptations in Indian Cities (IAdapt) supported by IDRC, Canada.

The project is being implemented in two cities – Solapur and Vijaywada and focusses on the principles of Integrated Urban Water Management and Integrated Water Resource Management not only in the city, but also surrounding rural areas looking at a catchment approach to water resource management.

As part of the capacity building activities of the project, an exposure visit was planned to showcase some of the good practices on urban water management.
  
During the three-day exposure visit, officials got an opportunity to visit Ambazari lake recreational area, Gorewada Water Treatment Plant (136 MLD), Bhandewadi Sewage Treatment Plant (200 MLD), MAHAGENCO’s Tertiary treatment plant (130 MLD) to recycle sewage for the usage at thermal power plant, decentralised phytorid based wastewater treatment plant and National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI).

The SMC officials also met officials of Nagpur Municipal Corporation and Orange City Water Pvt. Ltd. to discuss their experience of setting up SPV for water supply, prerequisites of 24X7 water supply, SCADA system for water management, system for quality and quantity monitoring, contracting, billing and PPP models. Officials also visited decentralised phytorid based wastewater treatment plant which uses nallah (wastewater stream) water for gardening and agriculture.

Technology Development Centre of NEERI provided insights of their research and development work on water and wastewater treatment. Overall, the visit was focussed on sustainable urban water management approaches that could be replicated at Solapur to suit with local situation. Participants mentioned that the visit was helpful and learnings would be implemented during the projects proposed under various schemes at Solapur.