GMDA Hires Consultant for Recycled Water Links

GURUGRAM: The Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority has appointed a consultant to prepare a detailed project report for integrating recycled-water pipelines across sectors 58 to 80 and 81 to 115, with officials targeting a functional network within about a year.

Pipelines already exist in parts of those belts, but they are not fully connected. Around 30 km in sectors 58 to 80 is only partly functional. About 58 km laid in sectors 81 to 115 stays unused because of missing links. By contrast, roughly 56 km in sectors 1 to 57 is already working. A senior GMDA official said the aim is to join the gaps so treated water can feed green belts, local parks and central road verges, cutting the use of drinking water for horticulture and other non-potable needs.

How much treated water is available now

GMDA currently generates 243 million litres a day of treated water at recycling plants in Dhanwapur and Behrampur, of which about 202 MLD is used. Officials break that down as roughly 143 MLD sent through an irrigation channel to Jhajjar for agriculture, 35 MLD for city horticulture, about 20 MLD to industry, and some supply to ponds for groundwater recharge.

New treatment units under construction at Behrampur and Dhanwapur are expected to add another 165 MLD by the end of next year. The authority wants the full pipeline network ready in the same window so the extra capacity is not stranded behind missing links.

For sector residents who still see tanker or potable water used on verges, the DPR is the paperwork step before trenches reopen. Until the consultant's design locks the missing stretches, the 58 km of idle pipe in the newer sectors remains a buried asset rather than a working irrigation line.

Missing links are a familiar Gurugram utility problem: pipes get laid with sector development, then sit dry until a later package funds the interconnects. The consultant's DPR is supposed to list those gaps stretch by stretch so a single works programme can join sectors 58 to 115 into one recycled-water grid. If that grid comes online alongside the extra 165 MLD from Behrampur and Dhanwapur, horticulture crews and verge contractors will have a clearer alternative to drawing on potable supply. Until then, the 58 km of idle pipe in the newer sectors remains the clearest measure of how much treated water capacity is still stranded underground.

Missing links are expensive twice: once when the pipe is laid without interconnects, and again when horticulture keeps drawing on potable water because the recycled line cannot deliver. GMDA's consultant brief is meant to stop that double cost by listing every gap between sectors 58 and 115 before a works tender is framed. Officials want that programme timed with the 165 MLD capacity addition so new treatment output is not bottled behind dry laterals. Residents in the newer sectors will judge success by whether park and verge watering actually switches away from drinking-water tankers once the links open.