The perfect 'society'

This is the season of AGMs of building societies and most of them are tall on talks and very poor on implementation.

But many all across India could take a lesson or two from the residents of Bhoomi Arcade in Kadivali East in Mumbai. In 2010, they decided that as a society they needed to get responsible and do things which will help sustain the environment. They started with Rain Water Harvesting (RWH), followed by waste management and later, solar energy.

Under RWH, water collected on the terrace is sent to a tank on the roof through a pipe. The tank supplies water to the toilets of each flat. Throughout the monsoon season, even if there is an average rainfall of 10 mm, the overhead tank collects 13,000 litres of water. Besides, fulfilling the annual water needs of flush tanks, the collected water is enough to suffice other non-potable needs of the residents for approximately 68 days.

The society’s decentralised composting system converts 900 kilos of wet waste into 150 kilos of compost every month which is added to the gardens. It sells the dry waste to the local scrap dealers once every two weeks.

The society has also installed 40 solar panels, each with 12 kilowatt capacity, which produces 55-60 units of electricity daily that power common lights, fans, lift, and water pumping station. During summers, the units generated go up to 500 while the building’s requirement is around 120. The surplus is exported to power distributing company and this gets credited in the building’s electricity bill every month. 

Now isn’t this how an ideal society should operate?