At Wailes/Likwati Primary Schools in Dar es Salaam, a new system for treating and reusing wastewater

DEWATS for Dar: Another FSTP Open for Business

On 17 March 2019, BORDA Tanzania together with Temeke Municipal Council, Dar es Saalam Regional Commissioner’s Office, Ifakara Health Institute (IHI) and Dar es Salaam Water and Sanitation Authority (DAWASA) inaugurated a new faecal sludge treatment plant (FSTP) at Wailes/Likwati Primary Schools in the Miburani ward of Temeke Municipality.

Under the umbrella of the “DEWATS for Dar es Salaam” project funded by UKAID’s Human Development Innovation Fund (HDIF), the FSTP is implemented by BORDA in cooperation with IHI, which provides support to water-sector institutions and establishes sustainable business strategies.

This project aims to maximise the reuse of treated wastewater in underserved communities in Miburani ward, and hence, lessen the challenges the community faces in managing its wastewater. At Wailes/Likwati, the treated wastewater will irrigate a banana plantation on the school grounds. The system will also generate biogas for cooking, which will be used by the school’s special-needs students.

The FSTP cost around 210 million Tanzanian shillings (about 83,000€), including the construction of a biogas settler, an anaerobic baffled reactor (ABR), an anaerobic filter (AF), sludge drying beds, and other supporting structures.

The plant can treat 10m³/day of faecal sludge, enabling it to serve up to 40,000 people, and can produce approximately 4,000 litres of biogas. The Wailes/Likwati facility is the second DEWATS constructed for the “DEWATS for Dar es Salaam” project. The first DEWATS, located in Mburahati, Ubungo Municipality, is already completed and in operation.

The project encompasses a suitable intervention plan, appropriate sanitation infrastructure and operational concepts together with behaviour change through community trainings, workshops, sanitation exhibitions, and door-to-door awareness-raising campaigns.