Tehran Province Water and Wastewater Company plans to build wastewater treatment plants in some districts, the managing director said.
“A memorandum of understanding was signed with the Tehran Municipality at the weekend to build the first local plant in District 22, westernmost part of the city,” Mohammadreza Bakhtiari was quoted as saying by ISNA.
There are plans to build another small-scale plant in District 4, eastern most part of the capital.
"The treated wastewater of each district will be used to water green spaces in the same region," the TPWWC official said.
Tehran Municipality annually draws 80 million cubic meters from underground water tables for green spaces. This will gradually replaced with treated wastewater, Bakhtiari said.
Water reserves in Tehran is estimated at 1.06 billion cubic meters, 70% of which comes from surface water and 30% groundwater.
Currently close to 3.3 million residents have access to the Tehran wastewater network and the number is expected to reach 11 million when the infrastructure is ready by 2023.
An estimated $2 billion has been spent on Tehran’s wastewater network development plan since 1995.
220 wastewater treatment plants operate in Iran and total sewage treatment capacity has reached 11 million cubic meters per day
The venture has registered work-in-progress of 78% and needs another $710 million to be completed.
The grid can help prevent pollution of underground water resources and reduce the need to tap into dwindling underground water tables.
Work is also underway at two major plants in Tehran. Two units are under construction in the South Wastewater Treatment Plant in the ancient city of Rey, which is the biggest of its kind in the country. Six units of the plant are in operation, but due to population density in southern areas there is need for more units.
The functioning units now cover 3.15 million people and treat 246 million cubic meters of wastewater per annum. With the two new units the plant will offer service to 4.2 million people.
Firouz Bahram Wastewater Treatment Plant in west Tehran is set to come online by 2021. It is the second largest in the country after the South Wastewater Treatment Plant. When operational, it will benefit 2.1 million people.
Expansion of wastewater network has been a priority in the sprawling capital for decades as the population expands in all four directions imposing extra burden on utilities that are already stretche.
If wastewater is not properly treated it can have dire consequences on human health and the environment.
A total of 220 wastewater treatment plants operate in Iran and total sewage treatment capacity has reached 11 million cubic meters per day.
An additional 32 plants are in different stages of construction and should come on stream within two years.
Over 7.5 billion cubic meters of usable water is annually produced, of which 4.3 bcm is wasted. Less than 25% of wastewater is recycled -- a situation that demands focus and responsibility from those in charge of water affairs.
Iran’s wastewater output is estimated at 1.2 billion cubic meters per year and 70% of water used by households can be reused with the help of wastewater treatment plants.
While 48% of the country’s treated wastewater is used for farming, about 45% of it enters surface waters, less than 0.5% is utilized by industries and 5% for watering urban green space.
Over 63,000 km of wastewater pipelines have been laid across the country and 295 cities are connected to the wastewater network.
