31st NIOT Foundation Day was celebrated on 09 Nov 2024. Dr. M Ravichandran, Secretary, MoES was the Chief Guest. NIOT has made progress over the years in development of the various modules of Blue Economy, having societal impact. Prof. Balaji Ramakrishnan, Director, NIOT gave an overview of the work undertaken at NIOT, notable among them being the desalination projects in the Lakshadweep Islands, efforts at development of deep sea submersibles, mining trials for marine resources – in particular polymetallic nodules, coastal protection, collection of marine data for weather and climate change assessment and prediction, fish cage culture and in the niche domain of deep water biotechnology.
The Ballast Water Treatment Technologies- Test Facility (BWTT-TF) established at the NIOT Sea Front Site at Pamanji & Vagarru villages in Tirupathi District of Andhra Pradesh was dedicated to the Nation by the Secretary, MoES. This facility is designed to comply with the international regulations of the Ballast Water Convention 2004 for testing and validation of Ballast Water Treatment System (BWTS) as per D2-discharge regulations of International Maritime Organization (IMO) for basic, type, final approval and also, revalidation of the already approved BWTS. This facility is unique and one of this kind in the tropical region and in South East Asia.
The Secretary, MoES also launched a web portal of Marine Microbial Repository of deep sea microbes in India, set up under the Deep Ocean Mission, in collaboration with C-DAC.
The Secretary, MoES in his address appreciated the work undertaken at NIOT, highlighting that much of the domains that NIOT was working in were niche engineering and technology areas, and stressed that the country looked up to them. He also exhorted NIOT to undertake capacity building by not only having collaborative research with the academia but also with industry in developing vertical experts and expertise and in converting ideas to products and in progressively converting imports to indigenous development.