One million people use century old Colombo sewers designed to ease 50, 000 – CMC 

• By KrishCNL
• August 8, 2025
• News, Political
• CMC, Sri Lanka
• 0 Comments

The century-old Colombo’s sewerage system has been designed to ease the waste materials of the then population of about 50, 000 persons back in the early 1900’s and not a staggering one million city dwellers at present, senior Colombo Municipal Council official said.

The planning of the Colombo’s Municipal Council area sewerage system commenced in 1896 with the construction was started in 1906 to be completed in 1925. The current sewage system in the Greater Colombo area serves the local authority areas of Colombo Municipal Council, Dehiwala – Mt. Lavinia Municipal Council and Kolonnawa Urban Council.

When contacted Commissioner Colombo Municipal Council Palitha Nanayakkara said the prevailing sewerage system is not sufficient at all for the current city population, which is beyond one million persons.

According to the latest figures collected in 2025, Colombo City has a residential population of over 612, 000 and is visited by a daily floating population or a workforce of over 500, 000 persons.

“The amount of daily waste water and excrement material produced by this massive crowd is carried through a system, which was built a hundred years ago and for a capacity of 50, 000 people. It is obviously insufficient to serve the present numbers, thus measures are now being taken to upgrade the system in near future,” Commissioner Nanayakkara said.

According to CMC statistics, the existing public sewerage system in Greater Colombo is old and limited in coverage. The wastewater master plan dated 1972 estimated that 66% of the population of the Colombo capital region was served by on-site facilities, 19% was served by the public sewerage system and 15% had no facilities.

The Colombo sewerage system has also suffered from various technical, institutional, managerial and operational problems. It operation has long been neglected under an adverse institutional environment. Further, financial resources obtained through local taxes and Government subsidies have been insufficient to fund sustainable delivery of wastewater services.

The Commissioner said discussions are being held at present by the newly appointed Council to upgrade the wastewater master plan by two years in a move to convert Colombo to a massive metropolitan city.

Additional reports by Kevin Kariyawasam