Wastewater Management in Kazakhstan
Current situation report
April 2013
Situation overview
With the needs of the republic in water equal to 100 km3 per year, the existing supply equals to
34.6 km3. Kazakhstan is ranked on the last place among CIS counties in water availability per
capita. Considering very low population density in the country, the numbers show that water
management is a serious issue for Kazakhstan.
Historically, the country faces a number of natural reasons of water shortage:
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Geographic location. Most of the water resources consist of landlocked lakes and basins
with no access to the ocean.
Precipitation level in the country is very low (except mountainous regions).
Even though proven reserves of underground drinking water could potentially meet the
needs of the country, development and exploration works of the reserves are very slow
due to difficult access to the waters.
In addition to natural obstacles, many years of intense and irrational development of irrigation
farming, as well as multiple thoughtless modifications of riverbeds in arid climate conditions,
have led to shortage of water in the basins of small and big rivers of the southern region, such
as Ili, Syr Darya, etc. A single generation witnessed Aral Sea to decrease on almost a half of its
size. A similar scenario awaits Balkhash Lake.
More than 200 million m3 of polluted wastewater is dumped in surface waters of the republic.
More than 3 million spots of groundwater pollution are detected by today.1 According to the
Ministry of Environment of Kazakhstan, more than 700 sources of groundwater pollution were
identified by 2010.
“Water will be the main problem of Kazakhstan. Water remains the main priority for the
Environment Protection Ministry. We see the figures, see the forecasts. We see water deficit
and see that it will be growing in Kazakhstan. If we don’t act, water supplies will be three times
lower than the demand by 2050” said the Environment Protection Minister Nurlan Kapparov at
the conference on green economy in Kazakhstan on April 12, 2013.
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Source: National Science Portal of the Republic of Kazakhstan
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"Today, half of all the water comes from neighboring states, and the other half from our own
water resources. We have certain calculations that say that trans-boundary waters will reduce
due to the fact that neighboring countries will increase their water consumption," he added. 2
Considering the current situation, the government pays high attention to wastewater
treatment and reuse.
Municipal wastewater management
Since Soviet times housing and utilities sphere was financed by state subsidies. This has led to a
high deterioration of utilities objects and networks. The reforms started in 1998, and mostly
included creation of national companies and restructuration of municipal bodies.
The weakest branch of housing and utilities sector is sewage management. This sphere can be
characterized by unstable and insufficient financial state of enterprises in the sector, as well as
lack of young and competent specialists. Corruption and ineffective management system of the
particular sector has a considerable effect as well.
Existing networks and facilities are significantly frayed, leading to an increase in crashes and
malfunctions of utilities objects, ubiquitous cost overruns in financial and technical resources,
high losses of energy and water. In 2009 the average crash rate varied from 0.2 to 29.5 crashes
per kilometer around the country.3
Urban municipal wastewater treatment
In 2011 proportion of the total area of Kazakhstan urban housing, equipped with wastewater
sanitation was 73.4%. 39 cities and towns had no treatment facilities at all, which means that
wastewaters are withdrawn without any purification there.
Only 64% of treated wastewater meet the requirements. Other 36% of unpurified wastewater
is withdrawn in wastewater ponds, this refers to the following Kazakh cities: Kokshetau, Uralsk,
Petropavlovsk, Kostanay.
Many existing wastewater treatment facilities have already worked out their operational
resources and need repair, others - work with overload, which leads to discrepancy of
wastewater treatment technology to the initial projected data.
Collectors of treated waste water are often filled to the limit marks, there is a constant threat
of emergency levees breakthrough, water pollution and flooding of settlements.
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Source: BBC Monitoring International Reports: Kazakhstan
Source: Ministry of Economic Development and Trade of the Republic of Kazakhstan
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Rural municipal wastewater treatment
In 2011 proportion of the total area of Kazakhstan rural housing, equipped with wastewater
sanitation was 8.8%. Among the equipped rural areas, only 45.4% of wastewater treatment
systems meet the standards. Other 54.6% of wastewater is withdrawn unpurified.
Before recent years, wastewater treatment facilities construction in rural areas was not in a
high attention of the government, as their first priority then was drinking water supply in the
regions.
Central executive bodies in municipal water treatment:
Kazakhstan Agency for Construction and Public
Utilities under the Ministry of Regional
Development of RK –
central executive body (http://ads.gov.kz/)
“KazakhVodokanal Project” JSC
“Kazakhstan Housing and Utilities
Modernization Center” JSC
the only state-owned specialized design
institute of Kazakhstan. The institute has
designed almost all of the city water supply
and sanitation systems in Kazakhstan, as well
as some objects in Russia, Central Asia and
Mongolia. The institute designs wastewater
treatment facilities, systems for disinfection
of natural and waste water, intake water
facilities. (http://www.kzvkp.kz/en/)
the center conducts research and
development studies within the sector;
facilitates G2B relations within the sector;
searches for investments; international
cooperation, which includes: organization
and conduct of bilateral and multilateral
meetings with international partners, study
of the requirements of international financial
institutions for loans and grants, search for
potential foreign investors.
(http://www.zhkh-center.kz/en/)
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Local executive bodies in municipal water treatment (Almaty):
Akimat of Almaty City (Mayor's Office)
http://www.almaty.kz/
Office of Energy and Public
Utilities of Akimat of Almaty City
"Tospa Su" State-owned Municipal
Enterprice
Provides services in sanitation, allocation
treatment, discharges of municipal
wastewater and further waste disposal.
http://as-tospasu.kz/
Municipal wastewater storage and treatment facilities in Almaty
Municipal wastewater sanitation, storage and treatment facilities are managed by “Tospa Su”
state-owned enterprise.
“Sorbulak" wastewater pond is a natural closed basin, north-west Almaty city, used to store the
city sewage wastewater.
Municipal wastewater treatment facilities are located to the southwest of Zhapek batyr
settlement, by Great Almatika river. Mechanical treatment facilities are located on the right
bank, and biological treatment - on the left, outside the coastal water protection zone.
Facilities of mechanical and biological treatment are interconnected by six steel threads of the
Almaty culvert. Wastewater treatment facilities provide complete mechanical and artificial
biological wastewater treatment, with post-treatment of the wastewater in the stackers and
bio-ponds and subsequent chlorine disinfection of water for further withdrawal to Ili River. Raw
sludge and mud are pumped to the sludge area.
A bio-pond with growing cane was created within the complex in 1998. Higher aquatic plants
reduce the toxicity of the wastewaters and provide additional purification of the water from
heavy metal salts.
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Urban sewage treatment facilities were constructed in several stages, 1965-1974 (mechanical
treatment plant) and 1974-1992 (bio-treatment plant).
Industrial wastewater management
According to the Ministry of Environment Protection of Kazakhstan, in 2011 half of the
withdrawn wastewaters from 43 large industrial enterprises do not meet the requirements,
concentration of hazardous substances in the withdrawn waters exceed the maximum accepted
limits.
Significant amount of industrial waste water goes directly to municipal treatment facilities that
are not designed for treatment of industrial waste water.
According to the Rules of acceptance of wastewaters into municipal sanitation systems,
approved by the government of Kazakhstan, industrial waste water, which does not conform to
minimal acceptable rate of concentration of hazardous substances, shall be the subject to pretreatment on the local wastewater treatment facilities. There is a significant number of cases,
when enterprises have bended that rule. There are regular publications on direct withdraws of
wastewaters into rivers and lakes by industrial enterprises appearing in mass media.
In May 2012 the Committee for Environmental regulation and monitoring of the Ministry of
Environment Protection outlined the main reasons for high level of pollution of surface waters.
The Committee Chairman Daniyar Erenchinov mentioned that "a large amount of polluted
wastewaters withdrawn into water basins of the country come from the mining industry.
According to Mr. Erenchinov, in 2011 the cause of pollution of Nura river with nitrites was
wastewater withdrawals from Arselor Mittal Temirtau and Temirtau Electrometallurgical Plant.
In 2011 the poisonous cyanide leaked into Sekisovka river of East Kazakhstan region. Hazardous
waste that can fatally poison a human came into the river from a gold-mining company.
Ecologists say that the concentration of cyanide in the river is 400(!) times higher than norm.
Moreover, Aktobe enterprises continue to withdraw wastes containing hexavalent chromium
into the river.
On the other hand, with the rise of the issue in society, success stories from some began to
appear in mass media. Thus, the first anaerobic wastewater treatment plant in Kazakhstan was
built in Carlsberg Kazakhstan brewery.
According to Carlsberg, all waste waters that come from production sites and municipal
buildings of the enterprise will be cleaned by almost 100%. Moreover, anaerobic plant can
process the bacterial products into bio-gas and use it as biologically clean fuel for boilers.
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Government policy in water resource management
The upcoming Expo-2017 exhibition, which will be held in Astana and dedicated to green
economy has led to activisation of the government in water ecology sphere. Importance of the
efforts being taken by the Kazakh Environmental Protection Ministry to ensure the rational use
of water resources was highlighted at a meeting of President Nursultan Nazarbayev and
Minister Nurlan Kapparov on April 16, 2013.
In 2010, after the president Nazarbayev’s “Strategic plan of development of RK until 2020”
presentation, Kazakhstan Agency for Construction and Public Utilities has developed a program
of modernization of the whole housing and utilities sector. The program was approved by the
Prime Minister in November 2010 and includes an action plan until 2020.
Later in 2011 Ministry of Economic Development and Trade of the Republic of Kazakhstan has
developed a targeted program, aimed to provide solutions for quality drinking water supply and
wastewater disposal services. The “Akbulak” program replaces the earlier “Drinking Waters”
program for 2003-2010. Developers of the new program for 2010-2020 have stated a number
of defects in realization of the previous program. Among them were:
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lack of a systematic approach and proper cooperation between central and local
executive bodies;
lack of monitoring of the implementation of the projects of water supply and sanitation;
low level of development of project and finance estimation documents;
shortage and high turnover of professional staff, as well as lack of system of education
and development of industry specialists.
The document highlights low level of development of project and finance estimation
documents as one of the main reasons of low-quality construction of objects of sewerage and
treatment of wastewater. More than 326 thousand various defects and deviations from project
standards were identified in the projects during 2009.
As of January 1, 2010 local authorities in Kazakhstan have issued 12,000 licenses for project
works. At the same time, less than 50 organizations specialize in projects on water supply and
disposal and have a good industrial base and skilled professionals.
Today the project estimates for construction of wastewater facilities are often completely
missing costs of commissioning. This omission negatively affects input exploitation of the
facilities. Often, complex objects, which were accepted without setup are not serviced and do
not work.
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Highlights of Akbulak Program:
The following government bodies are responsible for the program implementation: Agency for
Construction, Housing and Utilities of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Ministry of Agriculture of the
Republic of Kazakhstan; Ministry of Environment Protection of the Republic of Kazakhstan;
Ministry of Industry and New Technologies of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Ministry of
Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Ministry of Healthcare of the Republic of
Kazakhstan; Agency on Regulation of Natural Monopolies of the Republic of Kazakhstan;
Ministry of Finance of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Akims (Mayors) of regions and Astana and
Almaty Cities; Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan on Statistics.
Some target figures of the program related to wastewater management:
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Access to piped sanitation in rural areas will be 20% of the total number of villages;
centralized water sanitation in cities - 100%.
The proportion of wastewater treated to standard values to the total value of
wastewater passed through treatment facilities will increase from 64% to 100% in 2020.
The program will be implemented in two stages:
1. 2011 to 2015
2. 2016 to 2020
The program will be financed out of the funds of development institutions, at the expense of
operators, by domestic and foreign investment as well as by the state budget allocations in the
amount of 1 273 859 million tenge (approx. $8.5 billion, $1=150 tenge).
One of the examples of participation of international financial institutions in the project can be
the recent news regarding EBRD giving 10.3 million euros for Shymkent wastewater system
modernization. The new financing is to pay the extension of wastewater services to up to 3,500
new customers living in private houses, the vast majority of which are not currently connected
to a wastewater network. The previous contribution to the project by EBRD in 2010 financed
rehabilitation of the existing wastewater treatment plant and construction of a new biogas
plant, which is scheduled to be completed at the end of 2013.4
4
Kazakhstan Newsline, #1737 - April 10, 2013
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Opportunity statement
The spheres of interest for wastewater treatment facilities suppliers in Kazakhstan market can
be divided into for directions:
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Design, construction and service of large-scale municipal waste water management
facilities. Cooperation with the government bodies in Kazakhstan, participation in
national tenders.
Design, construction and service of small-scale municipal waste water management
facilities. Mainly refers to rural areas. Cooperation with the government bodies.
Design, construction and service of large-scale wastewater management facilities for
large industrial companies in oil & gas, mining and other top sectors of production in
Kazakhstan. Participation in the tenders of the companies.
Design, construction and service of small-scale wastewater management facilities for
smaller production sites. The advice would be to work through local distributors/agents.
Current attention from the government, and respectively from mass media to the issue of
waste water management and water ecology makes the sector very attractive. Both
government and private businesses are looking forward to improve their public image with
introducing ecological and sufficient waste water treatment solutions.
The threats in entering the market include corruption, ineffective management, insufficient
budgets as well as tendency of local buyers to prefer low price over quality of products and
services.
Related Exhibitions and Events
EcoTech 2013
3-6 September 2013, Almaty
List of participants in 2012:
http://www.ecotech.kz/en/water/ex_list2012wt/
Astana Expo2017
“Future Energy”
Website of the event:
http://www.expo2017astana.com/en
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