Your car’s shine is probably making Visakhapatnam drier

VISAKHAPATNAM: Even while reeling under an acute water shortage, the city is using up thousands of litres of water every day to clean its cars. A strong sea breeze and coal dust from the port area mean Visakhapatnam cars need frequent washes and with a steady increase in the number of vehicles on city roads, this may well be one of the reasons of water shortage in the city.
“The older part of the city and areas along the Beach Road have been grappling with coal dust pollution for decades. If you are a car owner in Vizag, you are compelled to wash your car frequently,” said Samorendra Mohan Ghosh, an automobile engineer turned environment activist of the city.
There are around 389 car-wash agencies in the city and they use 12 to 14 litres of water each time a car is cleaned. As per RTO records, there are more than 12 lakh vehicles running on Visakhapatnam roads, and they are washed pretty frequently. Interestingly, though agencies have tried to introduce technologies that use up less water, they have not found many takers.
“In 2015, spending more than Rs 8 lakh, we imported steam-wash technology from Korea. It costs merely Rs 150 to Rs 200 more than a conventional car wash and hardly one litre of water is needed for each wash. But people were reluctant to use this technology and we had to drop the idea last year,” said Jagdeesh Kumar CH, owner of a car-wash agency.
Agencies had also imported cream-wash and ceramic coating technologies. While the former does not involve use of water at all, the latter makes a car less prone to dust at least for two to three years. However, none of these methods succeeded to garner interest in Vizag.
Groundwater levels in Visakhapatnam have taken a hit and even the reservoirs have dried up owing to shortage of rainfall. In fact, Greater Visakha Metropolitan Development Authority fears that the city might face its worst-ever water crisis if there is no rain in three to four weeks.