Water will only be enough to cater to the drinking water needs
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Hyderabad: October 31 was officially the last day of flood inflows into the Krishna and the Godavari, and Telangana and AP will have to make do with whatever water has collected in the Srisailam and Nagarjunasagar reservoirs till the next monsoon. It is estimated that the water will only be enough to cater to the drinking water needs of the two states. Officials have estimated that the inflows this season have been the worst. The Srisailam dam received only 60.99 TMC ft (thousand million cubit feet) against recent ‘bad’ years when it has received 224 TMC ft ( 2002-03), 156 TMC ft (2003-04) and 235 TMC ft ( 2012-13). Usually the dam receives at least 600 TMC ft.
The Krishna River Management Board, which met on October 28, had repeatedly advised both Telangana and AP governments to be very cautious with the usage of available water at both the dams and has directed officials to restrict the use only to meet the drinking water needs till July 2016. The KRMB has also decided to release waters from both dams keeping in view the requirements of both the states till December 2015.
At a review meeting held by AP Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu on October 26, it was pointed out by engineering officials that the scope of releasing waters to the ‘Chennai drinking water scheme’ through Telugu Ganga from Pothireddypadu head regulator at Srisailam was remote with the dam level going down by 846 feet and with KRMB allowing release of waters to NS Dam to meet the drinking water requirements of both states.
Now the only way left for the AP government is to augment supplies to Chennai from the Somasila-Kandaleru dead storage levels. KRMB chairman S.K.G. Pandit had mentioned at the meeting: “Considering the grim storage positions on account of poor monsoon, the available water has to be judiciously used for drinking water purpose only, keeping in mind requirements of the remaining part of the year.”
It was decided at the meeting that Nagarjunasagar should not be operated below 510 ft level and Srisailam below 790 ft level. It was estimated that the water available above 790 ft in Srisailam as on October 28 was 48.69 TMC ft and KRMB ordered the release of 14.7 TMC ft to meet the drinking water requirement of both the states. This was to be completed in 10 days.
The level of 510 ft at Nagarjunasagar should be maintained because Hyderabad city depends on it for its drinking water needs under the three phases of the Krishna scheme.
Similarly, Nalgonda and Khammam of Telangana, Guntur, Prakasam and Krishna districts of AP depend on Nagarjunasagar releases for drinking water. On the Godavari front, while AP is getting some significant inflows at the Dowaleswaram barrage due to its location at the end of the river, Telangana is suffering with very poor inflows into the Sriram Sagar project, Nizamsagar, and Singur-Manjeera dams that supply drinking water to the twin cities. The Sriram Sagar project received just 2.16 TMC ft during the entire season, a record low. Singur received only 0. 69 TMC ft, thus making the north Telangana district municipalities facing a severe drinking water crisis.
( Source : deccan chronicle )
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