Wastewater Allocation and Pricing Model for the Efficient Functioning of CETP Serving a Textile Industrial Cluster

Textile industry produces a quarter of the global industrial wastewater effluent, and most of the pollutants get added in the dyeing and printing processes of fabric production. Due to improper disposal and non-stringent policies, there is visible pollution of river bodies, degraded environmental flows and groundwater contamination. Since the cost of treatment to acceptable quality standards is high, industries operate by using cheaper water sources like lifting groundwater or bypassing the common effluent treatment plants (CETPs). Also, industries with small-scale production cannot bear the high cost levied on them by the authorities to recover the collective cost incurred by CETP. Thus, it is necessary to ensure that discharge and concentration of effluent sent to CETP by member industries are manageable, and industries pay as per their effluent quality and quantity. In this study, for the textile industrial cluster in Balotra, Rajasthan, in India, the zero liquid discharge (ZLD) technique has been proposed. Subsequently, the optimal allocation of effluent discharges for member industries in study region has been formulated. Using the industrial outflow data obtained from government agreements, the optimization relation between concentration, flow and cost has been implemented. The result obtained is the number of industries and their full or fractional wastewater share depending upon the value of fractional allocation (25, 33, 50, 66, 75 or 78%). This study can serve as an alternative to the existing ad hoc method of taxing member industries for wastewater treatment and lead to a win–win situation for industries, CETPs and the environment.