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Water Supply

Call for water budgeting, restoring waterbodies

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The Hindu       08.02.2017   

Call for water budgeting, restoring waterbodies

The city’s households spend a minimum of 3% of their monthly income towards water, particularly during drought conditions, to cope with the shortfall in piped water supply.

With the growing gap between demand and water availability, it is essential to have a water budget and develop a sustainable drainage system during urban planning, experts stressed here recently.

At a media workshop on ‘Floods, cyclone and drought: The puzzle of Chennai’s water and climate’, organised by Care Earth Trust, K.S. Kavi Kumar of Madras School of Economics said many households with piped water connection spend Rs. 553 per month towards water needs. Those without piped water supply spend Rs. 658 per month on the same.

People without municipal water supply spend nearly 6.2% of their monthly income towards sourcing water from the private sector. Citing various studies, he said besides implementing water metering system, the government sector must change the pricing strategy. At present, the cost of water supply is nearly Rs. 13-15 per kilo litre. Economic incentives may be provided to encourage reduction in use.

Workshop on city’s water supply situation underlines the need to increase the reservoir capacity

 

City to get water from Siruvani soon

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The Hindu     07.02.2017

City to get water from Siruvani soon

TWAD Board, with approval from Kerala, to pump 20-30 million litres of water a day

Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage(TWAD) Board will soon pump Siruvani water to the city. According to sources, the Board, with approval from the Kerala Government, will pump 20 - 30 million litres of water a day to the city.

It will pump the water from dead storage area on the Siruvani Reservoir’s bed to the fourth in-take valve (the lowest). From there the water will reach the city through the main supply line. And from the main storage reservoir in Bharathi Park, the Corporation will supply the water to the city’s residents.

The TWAD Board sources say that after it got the green signal, it has started taking steps to pump the water. It would take a day or two for the water to reach the Bharathi Park reservoir.

Corporation sources say that it will use the water to feed the residents in the five Siruvani-dependent areas - Wards 15, 18, 19, 20 and 21 - who are hitherto fed with lorries.

Meanwhile, the Corporation is in talks with owners of private water tankers to increase the water supply. Sources say that the civic body has at present engaged 12 lorries in the five wards. This is likely to go up in the coming days.

Alternatively, the Corporation has also planned to erect water tanks on lanes and by-lanes in the five wards.

A preliminary estimate suggests that the Corporation will have to erect up to 60 tanks to feed residents on the lanes and by-lanes, where lorries would not be able to reach them. The tankers will fill water in the tanks and from the tanks the residents will fetch water.

The sources say that this will also reduce the time taken by lorries to supply water and result in increase in number of trips. At present each lorry does about five trips a day.

The sources add that all this depends on the tapping of the Siruvani water. If it comes through then the situation will ease a bit.

 

Call for water budgeting, restoring waterbodies

Print PDF

The Hindu       07.02.2017  

Call for water budgeting, restoring waterbodies

The city’s households spend a minimum of 3% of their monthly income towards water, particularly during drought conditions, to cope with the shortfall in piped water supply.

With the growing gap between demand and water availability, it is essential to have a water budget and develop a sustainable drainage system during urban planning, experts stressed here recently.

At a media workshop on ‘Floods, cyclone and drought: The puzzle of Chennai’s water and climate’, organised by Care Earth Trust, K.S. Kavi Kumar of Madras School of Economics said many households with piped water connection spend Rs. 553 per month towards water needs. Those without piped water supply spend Rs. 658 per month on the same.

People without municipal water supply spend nearly 6.2% of their monthly income towards sourcing water from the private sector. Citing various studies, he said besides implementing water metering system, the government sector must change the pricing strategy.

At present, the cost of water supply is nearly Rs. 13-15 per kilo litre. Economic incentives may be provided to encourage reduction in water use.

The need to increase the reservoirs’ capacity and boost groundwater recharge was also underlined during the workshop. Pointing out that the water demand of the expanding city is projected to increase to 2003 million litres by 2021, Balaji Narasimhan, Associate Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, IIT Madras, said it is imperative to restore waterbodies and demarcate their boundaries to store flood water. During land-use planning, it is essential to identify land to store excess runoff along with allocation of OSR land, he added.

Speakers also highlighted the recent extreme weather events due to climate change and emphasised the importance of restoration of wetlands as part of disaster management. While Uma Ramachandran of IFMR-LEAD spoke on how innovative methods were used in various sectors to help residents during December 2015 floods, Avantika Bhaskar of Care Earth Trust, spoke on the role of wetlands in storing floodwater and ensuring better groundwater quality.

Workshop on city’s water supply situation underlines the need to increase the reservoir capacity

 


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