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The Toshiba association has opened doors to new geographies and new business segments

The Toshiba association has opened doors to new geographies and new business segments

The water and wastewater treatment market in India is in the growth phase and has immense untapped potential - Koichi Matsui, Chairperson and Managing Director, UEM India

Toshiba Corporation has acquired a majority stake in UEM India Private Limited. What are the expertise and technological competence brought in by this acquisition?

Toshiba has established itself as Japan’s leading manufacturer of electrical system for water supply and sewerage facilities for over 40 years, and has expanded the business into overseas markets. India has the potential to provide Toshiba a promising opportunity to develop water-related business in the future by bringing in Toshiba’s advanced water treatment technology and project management skills. To augment this opportunity, a strategic control in UEM enabled Toshiba to bring in synergies with its other business and enabled UEM to become one of the global leaders in Water and Waste Water Management Business. UEM became a ‘Toshiba Group Company’ on 15th September 2015. This strategic amalgamation of UEM in Toshiba Group helped in spearheading UEM’s growth as a global leader in the area of water and waste water management. The Toshiba association has opened doors to new geographies and new business segments which UEM can address through its cost advantage and vast experience in delivering complex, turnkey services. Toshiba - UEM synergy has already resulted in prestigious orders from distinguished clients in India as well as abroad.

UEM India has recently bagged contract to design, build and operate (DBO) a wastewater treatment and recycling plant in Oman, please share with us the details and scope of this project?

UEM has been awarded a contract to design, build and operate an industrial wastewater treatment and recycling plant in the Sultanate of Oman for client Majis Industrial Services, which is a well-known agency that provides water solutions and services to Oman’s growing industrial port and other special economic areas in Sohar. The Project ‘CETRP Phase 1, Sohar Industrial Port’ is being constructed to serve the Sohar Industrial Port Area (SIPA). This central effluent treatment and recycling plant will treat, recycle and reuse TIE or Treated Industrial Effluent within the SIPA. UEM will construct and operate a 10,000m3/d plant for a period of five years with an option for five year extension.
This new design will also integrate a pre-existing sewage treatment plant of 3,000m3/d capacity already at the site. This project will incorporate technologies like ‘moving bed bio reactor’, ‘heavy metal removal’ and ‘UF/RO membrane’.

 What are the growth drivers and challenges for the water and wastewater industry in India?

India’s ever expanding population, rapid urbanization and constant economic growth have increased the demand for fresh water in the past decade. The over-exploitation of water resources has led to depleting per capita availability of water and deteriorating water quality, this has forced our country to look for sustainable and effective solutions to provide clean and quality water to the masses. The water and wastewater treatment market in India is in the growth phase and has immense untapped potential. In recent decades, compliance with Government wastewater quality requirements has been the primary driver of industrial wastewater treatment programs in India. On the flipside the biggest challenge the industry faces, is the slow pace of implementation of policy reforms. However, I am sure that with the improvement in the business environment, one can expect several initiatives aimed at water supply
and sanitation.

What are the engineering and procurement services UEM India offers?

Engineering & Procurement mode of project delivery is adopted by clients who prefer self-execution of projects; ie, the client would require just engineering and procurement part be served and would prefer to take up the civil works part of the treatment plant themselves. It is a very practical in case of large international projects where availing the necessary equipment for the civil works would be convenient for local third party contractors. Over the years we have delivered many projects in which UEM was responsible for ‘Engineering’ and ‘Procurement’ – ie, UEM was responsible for engineering, equipment procurement, and site supervisory services while the construction and erection of equipment was performed by the client or a third party. Some examples of projects where UEM has provided value-added engineering services and procurement expertise include Indorama, AB Mauri Vietnam, United Paper Mills, Dubai, Aurus Thailand and others. In keeping with the competencies of an EPC company of course, UEM has a brilliant capability of civil engineering and construction as well. In the years that we have been providing water and waste water solutions to our clients, our prime focus area has been to listen to our clients requirements and depending upon it UEM is committed to deliver end-to-end solutions right from the stage of ‘plant planning’ to the ‘commissioning’ and subsequent operation and maintenance.

What are the feasibility studies carried out before the commencement of a wastewater management project?

UEM has the in-depth process knowledge to conduct feasibility studies for a client’s potential water and wastewater projects. Whether a client is exploring the feasibility of recycling treated wastewater for reuse as process or utility water or is interested in determining the lowest life-cycle-cost solutions for treating their wastewater, we have the ability to provide unbiased recommendations which  is a result of our extensive experience in effluent treatment. Feasibility studies  includes ‘Economic Feasibility’ to carry out cost-benefit analysis, ‘Technical Feasibility’ to access potential risks and their solution, ‘Operational feasibility’, ‘Schedule feasibility’ to estimate timelines and optimize resources and time to accomplish project activities as per the schedule and also ‘Legal feasibility’ to bind to the copyrights, financial reporting requirements, contractual obligations, ownership, outsourcing arrangements, etc. Feasibility study enables one to carry out Payback analysis, Net Present Value Analysis, Return on Investment Analysis before project activities commence thereby opening the opportunities for cost optimization right at the beginning of the Project Lifecycle.

What are the challenges and opportunities Government’s urban renewal schemes like AMRUT offer for UEM India in wastewater management?

Water is a hot investment area in India. Water/wastewater treatment in India is a $4 billion industry and is growing at 10-12 percent every year. Several agencies like World Bank, ADB, JICA are funding various prestigious municipal projects in several states of India. Projects under the AMRUT scheme involving lake and river conservation will give further impetus to the Industry. Further NMCG has identified several key projects along the Ganges river in the states of Uttarakhand, UP, Bihar, Jharkhand & West Bengal involving STP & Sewerage schemes worth over 50,000 crore. The demand for Industrial wastewater treatment & water recycle and reuse projects will grow as per India’s economic growth. Growth in the Power, Refineries and other sectors will augur well for the Industrial Wastewater Treatment Market.

What are the latest technological trends and innovations in water and wastewater management?

The water and wastewater management industry has seen a change in thought and approach during the last few years, from ‘Treat to Discharge’ to ‘Recycle, Reuse and Zero Liquid Discharge’. This change in approach is direct result of the technology and expertise that is available now. We at UEM make a careful study of our clients and provide them with the right solutions which make use of the latest top in class technology. With Toshiba’s product portfolio, UEM is adequately equipped to offer high technology solutions to its customers, viz, Zero Liquid Discharge, Ozonizer, High Speed Clarifier to name a few.

Operation and Maintenance (O&M) have become a critical factor for the smooth operation of wastewater treatment plants. What are the challenges, opportunities and growth potentials Operation and Maintenance of wastewater treatment plants offer?

UEM has in-house operations and maintenance (O&M) resources for operating water and wastewater treatment systems and can offer this as a part of a complete design-build-operate package. UEM can also take over the O&M responsibilities of treatment systems built by others for those clients who wish to outsource this work. We possess the institutional knowledge to rapidly address commonly encountered operational issues. We provide a complete range of O&M services with highly trained professionals with backgrounds in many process units associated with water and wastewater treatment plants. Our UEM O&M team has acquired knowledge in troubleshooting various process units and addressing commonly encountered issues of running a plant, especially with respect to process chemistry, equipment maintenance, and engineering. UEM’s O&M core competency includes aerobic treatment, anaerobic treatment, physico – chemical and primary treatment, membrane treatment and desalination.

What are the anaerobic solutions offered by UEM India?

UEM provides a wide variety of energy efficient anaerobic solutions including solutions for recycle and reuse of treated wastewater.  The anaerobic solutions offered by UEM are anaerobic hybrid digesters and low rate anaerobic digestion. The anaerobic hybrid digesters or AHD is a combination of an up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) digester and an up-flow filter (UFF) digester – the open design plastic media offers a high specific surface area and maximum void space. We have installed more than 20 hybrid anaerobic digesters for various industries such as petrochemicals, breweries, paper, soaps & cosmetics, food, etc. Anaerobic digestion has become an increasingly popular technology for treating wastewater, we have installed more than 60 low rate anaerobic digester systems for various industries such as distilleries, breweries, pharmaceuticals, pulp & paper, citric acid, yeast, chemicals, etc. These digesters provide a large volume (hydraulic retention time: 15- 45 days), offering better process stability with consistent performance and biogas generation. BOD reductions of 80%- 95% and COD reductions 60% – 80% can be achieved, depending on the nature of the wastewater.  Toshiba also has their own USAB technology which now UEM too is able to deliver.

Which is your most challenging industrial waste and water treatment project in India?

As on date we have handled various types of effluent that gets generated from the industries for example brewery, textile, pharmaceutical, tannery, beverage, steel, refinery, petrochemical, petroleum, automobile, power, hospital, etc and have access to advanced technologies like UF and HEROTM which are employed to treat challenging effluents and zero liquid discharge with high performance and low life cycle cost. One such challenging project that we are executing is in Oman for ‘Majis Industrial Services’, here we are deploying high level purifying treatment technology and facilities utilizing an ultrafiltration membrane, reverse osmosis membrane and ion-exchange resin filtration system. Another project that is worth mentioning is the PTA Plant for JBF Petrochemicals at Mangalore. PTA wastewater is one of the most challenging wastewater to treat. The system offered is a comprehensive one and comprises of a combination of anaerobic, aerobic, ultrafiltration, heavy metal removal system followed by RO System. The treated effluent from this plant shall have a COD of less than 125 ppm. The key point is not only to deliver the appropriate plant, ie, EPC, but also it’s effective operations and maintenance on a day-to-day basis. Without appropriate plant operation and maintenance, the plant will not function well and the repercussions of poor O&M are quite drastic on factory operation and management.

What are your upcoming projects in India?

We are coming up with a 14 MLD sewage treatment plant on SBR Technology funded by World Bank under NMCG scheme at Allahabad for UPJN, two sewage treatment plants of 7&5 MLD capacity based on SBR Technology & Sewerage works funded by World Bank at Sahibganj for JUIDCO, 48 MLD STP in Vasna Gujarat, among others.




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