Water Pollution Abatement in Small Paper Mills in India

Abstract

In order to reduce the demand for the forest based raw materials by the organised industrial sectors like the large integrated pulp and paper mills, the Government of India started promoting several small-scale pulp and paper mills based on non-wood agricultural residue raw materials. However promotion of these small mills has created another environmental problem i.e. severe water pollution due to non-recovery of chemicals. Because of the typical characteristics like high silica content etc. of the black liquor produced and the subsequent high capital investment needed for a recovery system, it is not economically feasible for the small Indian mills to recover the chemicals. While the quantity of wastewater generated per tonne of paper produced by a small mill is same as from a large integrated pulp and paper mill with a chemical recovery system, their BOD load is four times higher, due to non recovery of chemicals. However the existing wastewater disposal standards are uniform for large and small mills for e.g. 30 mg BOD/l. To meet these standards, the small mills have to install a capital intensive wastewater treatment plant with heavy recurring operating costs. Therefore the feasible alternative is to implement various pollution abatement measures, with the objective of not only reducing the fibre/chemical loss but also to reduce the investment and operating costs of the final wastewater treatment system. To illustrate this approach, a case study on water pollution abatement and control in a 10 TPD mill, will be discussed.