pharmIn2

The Indian pharmaceutical industry plays an important role in the production of pharmaceuticals. In India, low-cost medicines are produced for the world market, a large part of which is exported to Europe - and the trend is rising. With an annual growth rate of 10 - 12 %, the industry aims to become the world market leader by 2030 and to increase its sales to 130 billion US dollars (1). However, this big business comes at a very high price. Polluted wastewater from pharmaceutical factories, laced with toxic chemicals and heavy metals, is usually discharged untreated into rivers or the environment - with devastating effects on human health and ecosystems.

Piloting new ozone technologies for the treatment of heavily contaminated pharmaceutical wastewater

Before being discharged into rivers, pharmaceutical wastewater requires pre-treatment, which ideally takes place directly on the plant site. The aim of the "pharmln2" project of up2e! GmbH and the Hof University of Applied Sciences is to pilot the a3op® technology developed by up2e! for the treatment of heavily polluted wastewater from pharmaceutical industries. The project applies a comprehensive approach: Using a plant adapted to local conditions, pilots will be carried out to demonstrate the functionality and efficiency of the ozone technology in India. Target groups are Indian pharmaceutical companies, operators of central wastewater treatment plants and service providers of pharmaceutical wastewater treatment, as well as public institutions, associations and universities. For the necessary adaptations of the technology to local conditions and market requirements in India, the project collaborates with the Indian company Paques Environmental Technology India Pvt. Ltd. The water-treatment pilot plant will be designed in such a way that the general functioning of the technology can be communicated to local stakeholders and a transfer to other industrial sectors can be demonstrated.

Creating a framework for establishing wastewater treatment technologies as an environmental standard in India

Through the development of a special training and information platform, the development of operator models and the participation in trade fairs and information events, the project aims to create the necessary framework conditions for establishing state-of-the-art technology in the field of wastewater treatment as a new environmental standard in India. Furthermore, an E-learning-based information and training platform will be developed to train interested pharmaceutical companies and players from the wastewater sector in the use of a3op® technology. The platform will be developed under the leadership of the Institute for Water and Energy Management (iwe) at Hof University. To ensure that the innovative process is also taken into account in the formulation of environmental regulations in the Indian wastewater sector, the project partners will also involve decision-makers in the project. To this end, the Bavarian-Indian Center for Business and Higher Education (BayIND) will bring in its long-standing experience in working with decision-makers at the government level, in universities, from industry leaders and global experts in the environmental sector in India.

The project will contribute to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in particular SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation) and SDG 9 (Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure).

(1) cf. https://static.investindia.gov.in/2020-08/Invest%20India%20Pharma%20Report_SIRU.pdf