Technocrats appeal Punekars to conserve water
- Green Salute a revolutionary new car wash service from Dhok Brothers offers better results and saves precious water
- Green Salute launches Salute Water Initiative to educate Punekars about Water Conservation
Pune 19th May, 2016:It took two technocrat brothers – 37-year old Ninad Dhok and 32-year old Akshay Dhok – to believe in their conscious and launch a campaign to conserve water in Pune. For more than two years, the duo has-been working on innovative ways to address issue of water conservation and been exploring ways to help the city of Pune conserve millions of liters of nature’s most valuable gift to the humanity. Their passion, coupled with their relentless efforts in terms of research & development, has given birth to “Green Salute”, a unique service for Punekars that promises every vehicle owner to conserve approximately 10-15 liters of water DAILY.
India’s demand for water is growing at a rapid clip. As per a research paper, which was recently presented at a national symposium, India is expected to suffer from persistent water shortage by 2020 with the per capita accessibility of water coming down to less than 1,000 cubic meters. With India’s current per capita water consumption at 150 liters a day, it is essential that we all reduce the amount of water we waste or we will run out of water. If we do not change our lifestyle and careless attitude towards the Mother Nature, India will certainly experience severe water stress in the coming years.
Water scarcity is not today’s challenges; it’s not a topic to be discussed over monsoon predictions; it’s something that all of us have to think through the next 100 or 200 years. While the governments at the central as well as state levels will do what it takes to tackle the issue of growing shortage of water, every municipal corporation, every society, every family and every individual will have to also contribute to the conservation of this precious commodity.
The total number of vehicles plying on Indian roads is estimated to grow to 400-450 mn in the next 20 years, from nearly 70 million vehicles currently, making India the world’s second-biggest automobile market after China. These numbers must be looked from the other perspective, too. India’s 1.25-bn population must have access to clean drinking water. Currently 30% of the rural population lacks access to drinking water and of the 29 states; only 7 have full availability of drinking water for rural inhabitants. In most cities, clean drinking water is typically available for only 2-8 hours a day.
Talking particularly about Pune, traditionally, Pune has had sufficient water for the consumption of its inhabitants. However, with influx of population and the two consecutive drought situation in Maharashtra, the city administration’s supply is falling short of the demand.
Vehicle wash takes away a substantial part of the water and number of vehicle continues to grow. Pune is going to clock 30 lakh private vehicles by the end of 2016, making it the fifth-largest city in India in terms of vehicle population. Assuming each vehicle takes around 10 liters of water on an average on a single wash, we are talking about wastage of 150 lakh liters of water nearly every day.
Amid the growing concerns about the imminent water crisis, Dhok brothers launched “Green Salute”service, an initiative that aims at conserving water by reducing its wastage in one of the routine activity – vehicle wash. “Green Salute” is a revolutionary new method that nearly eliminates wastage of water in vehicle wash while offering better results in terms of cleanliness and care of the vehicle.
Commenting on the launch of “Green Salute”, Mr. Ninad Dhok, Co-founder said, “Billions of liters of water is being wasted on washing cars everyday around the globe and we are absolutely certain that a significant amount of water can be saved if we can do away with water-based washing of vehicles. Now is the time when we have to step up to save water at every possible opportunity. We want to contribute to sustainable living and with this objective, we have come up with a concept that not only revolutionizes the process of washing cars, but also helps greatly in conserving water. “Green Salute” is not just another entrepreneurial venture, but it is our commitment to the country for conservation of the water resource.”
The idea behind this game changing service offering is that they can replace traditional car wash method and make the car wash process as a whole much quicker, easier and less labor-intensive, whilst still giving it a better finish as compared to traditional car wash. Green Salute’s Waterless car wash service used advanced surfactants, emulsifiers and lubricants to effectively encapsulate the dirt particles and hold them away from the surface ready to then be removed with microfiber towels.
Interestingly the country is also getting warm to such innovative offerings. The waterless car wash is getting traction in India as people are becoming increasingly concerned about water preservation, better results and increasing the life of their car exterior. The Green Salute service will be offered in Baner, Balewadi, Baner-Pashan Link Road and Pashan areas of Puneto start with. Over the course, Green Salute aims to introduce the concept of Waterless Car Cleaning to as many societies, corporate and individuals by means of a free demo.
Speaking on the occasion Mr Akshay Dhok, Co-founder of Green Salute said, “Over the last 3 months, we have been running a pilot of Green Salute service in limited areas of Pune. Our service has been availed by 60+ regular customers and with ‘1100’ sessions of cleaning, we are proud to say that we have saved “16,000” liters of water. Though the number is minuscule but as someone has said “Every drop counts”.
“We are urging Punekar’s to join the ‘Salute Water’ initiative and make a pledge for reducing water consumption on vehicle wash. The Salute Water Initiative is our Endeavour to highlight the misuse of water by Pune City and take actionable steps towards water conservation.” He further added.
As part of its service, the Green Salute team powered by electric bikes will follow a daily regimen of cleaning cars as per their schedule. Electric bikes usage is a symbol of Green Salute’s commitment towards the environment reducing Carbon Footprint of the organisation.
Mr. Geet Loney, the recently joined CFO of the company said, “Green Salute envisions itself to be a technologically led service that removes the challenges associated with the current methods of car cleaning and brings in accountability, transparency and standardization of the complete doorstep car cleaning eco-system. We have a host of packages starting from Rs. 599 per month for hatchback car which includes fifteen exterior cleaning and two interior cleaning sessions. Further customization is available as per individual need.”