VietNamNet Bridge - Vietnam plans to allocate big budgets to develop waste water drainage systems in urban areas in recent years. However, the systems’ conditions remain poor which still cause pollution because of low drainage capacity.

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The waste water drainage in urban areas depends on concentrated sewer systems. Separate water drainage systems only work in some urban areas in Da Lat, Buon Ma Thuot Cities and Phu My Hung urban area in HCMC.

A report showed that there are 30 urban waste water treatment plants as of July 2015 with total capacity of 809,000 cubic meters per day. There are 40 other plants under  design or construction with total capacity of 1.6 million cubic meters per day.

Though the plants all are operational, they only run at 50 percent of the designed capacity, while only 65 percent of the plants link with water drainage systems and 12 percent of domestic waste water can be treated. It is estimated that 4 percent of waste sludge can be treated if considering the current operation capacity.

A government’s report submitted to National Assembly’s Deputies in May 2015 showed that 90 industrial zones have been built or were building waste water treatment systems.

A government’s report submitted to National Assembly’s Deputies in May 2015 showed that 90 industrial zones have been built or were building waste water treatment systems.
Meanwhile, a report of the Ministry of Health released at a conference in June 2014 showed that only 50 percent of hospitals in the country have waste water treatment systems. In most of the 5,000 existing craft villages, waste water goes directly to the environment without any treatment.

Vietnam is seriously lacking waste water treatment stations. However, in many areas, existing waste water treatment stations have not been running not at capacity. 

The problem is that there are treatment stations, but there is not waste water to treat. Since there is no sewer to collect and transmit waste water, the stations have been running at moderate level.

The number of small-scale separate waste water collection and treatment systems that serve small communities has increased in recent years.

These include waste water treatment systems utilizing low-cost technology such as the sanitation system in Lai Xa commune of Hoai Duc district in Hanoi. The system uses septic tanks with thin baffles and Bastaf anaerobic filter.

The waste water treatment systems designed for a group of 30 households in Kieu Ky commune of Gia Lam district in Hanoi and Cho Moi & Cho Ra Towns in Bac Kan province are also separate systems.

Analysts noted that more separate systems have been built in Vietnam because of low investment costs and flexibility in management. However, how to operate and maintain the systems in a sustainable way remains the question.


Xay Dung