Water, Environment, Land and Livelihoods – Sumona Koley – 2025
Summary
Sumona Koley assessed decentralized sanitation technologies to enable sustainable wastewater management solutions for India’s urban landscape.
Goals
As a Climate Corps Fellow with WELL Labs, Sumona Koley set out to address one of India’s most pressing environmental challenges, untreated urban sewage. With nearly 72% of urban wastewater discharged directly into water bodies, her project aimed to evaluate alternative sanitation technologies that could bridge the vast infrastructure gap and promote decentralized wastewater treatment systems aligned with India’s sustainability and circular economy goals.
Solutions
Sumona conducted an extensive market and technology assessment covering 60 treatment technologies and 44 active systems, analyzing both electro-mechanical and nature-based processes. The study mapped the geographical presence of key technologies, their capital and operational costs, area and energy requirements, and the players driving innovation in each segment. Through comparative evaluation, she identified feasible options such as decentralized Eco-STPs, constructed wetlands, and container-based UDDT systems suitable for different user contexts. Her work will also help in developing a rapid-decision Excel tool to support policymakers and entrepreneurs in selecting context-appropriate sanitation solutions, thereby accelerating the adoption of decentralized wastewater management strategies.
Potential Impact
The findings from Sumona’s assessment offer a pathway to significantly reduce untreated wastewater discharge and improve sanitation access for millions of urban residents. By highlighting low-cost, low-energy, and space-efficient sanitation technologies, her work supports WELL Labs’ mission to advance sustainable infrastructure in rapidly urbanizing areas. The decision-support tool and insights from this study can help city planners, developers, and entrepreneurs scale decentralized sanitation systems, ultimately strengthening India’s progress toward clean water, safe sanitation, and climate resilience.
