The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has received queries from 21 bidders for the construction of the desalination plant at Manori at Mumbai, of which, one firm is based in Spain, and the other in the Middle East, the Mumbai civic body said on Tuesday.
According to the BMC, This was in response to a tender floated by the civic body for the second time in the past two years, after scrapping the first tender due to lack of response. The pre-bid meeting was held on Monday.
It said that to augment water supply in Mumbai, BMC has planned to construct a desalination plant on a 12 hectare plot in Manori, with a capacity of 200 Million Litres a day extendable by another 200 MLD.
Additional Municipal Commissioner Abhijit Bangar told mid-day, “We evidently need to augment the source of water supply for Mumbai, and the desalination plant is one of the main ways in which this can be done. With this project, we will also explore the feasibility of construction of another desalination plant.”
The desalination plant will draw water from upto three kilometers off the coast into the sea, and the plan also includes construction of three tunnels — two draw the water in for treatment, and one as an outfall for discharging the remains, Bangar said.
“To avoid taking water that has been affected by any muck or pollution from the city, we have decided to draw water from 2 to 3 kilometers away from the coastline,” he said.
The cost of the new plant is pegged at around Rs 3,000 crore.
At present, BMC supplies 3950 MLD of water to Mumbai, against a requirement of 4250 MLD of water.
The desalination plant — which will be the first in Maharashtra — will augment BMC`s water supply by 200 MLD.
