Review of Processes and Wastewater Quality Produced in Different Ready-Made Garment Industries of Bangladesh and Their Impact on the Potential Use of Zero Liquid Discharge Effluent Treatment Plant Systems

Abstract

In order to reduce the groundwater use, involved in different processes of the ready-made garments (RMG) industries of Bangladesh, the Government of Bangladesh (GoB) have decided to impose compulsory installment of zero liquid discharge effluent treatment plant (ZLD-ETP) systems in different RMG industries. Absence of proper monitoring facilities allows the RMG industries to extract groundwater, the major source of water supply in different industrial processes, in excess amount. The imposition of installing ZLD-ETP systems in different RMG industries would offset the demand on groundwater resulting from reuse of the treated effluent. The processes involved in different types of factories requires different amount of water and produces a wide range effluent quality. The present study aimed to investigate the processes involved in, and the quality of wastewater generated from different types of RMG factories in Bangladesh. The wastewater quality parameters tested in the present study are pH, TDS, TSS, DO, COD, and BOD5. These parameters are measured to design an effluent treatment plant to meet the discharged effluent quality standards set by the GoB. The present study also investigated design of existing ZLD-ETP systems used in different RMG industries of Bangladesh. The results suggest that the produced wastewater quality varies significantly among different types of industries. However, the ZLD-ETP systems installed in different factories are based on similar treatment strategy and only a few alternative treatment approaches are observed in practice. Hence there is an opportunity to design industry specific ZLD-ETP systems to produce recyclable water for use in respective industrial processes.