More borewells to control situation

Chennai: With three consecutive spells of southwest monsoon bringing poor rainfall and monsoon still playing hide and seek in north Kerala and south Karnataka, Chennai metro water officials are now working on a minimal guarantee water supply programme to residents, in which August will be the most crucial month.

At a recent meeting by Metro water officials it was decided to maintain the 470 mld water and at worse case this will drop to 430 mld so that this can be continued till September, metro water sources said.

Metro water managing director Arun Roy also instructed his field engineers to look out for more borewells in Tiruvallur and quarries in Kancheepuram where water can be tapped till October.

“We are hoping for the early release of Krishna water from Andhra but PWD officials in Andhra admit that they have only five tmc feet of water in Kandeluru and they usually release water to TN when the storage capacity nears 12 to 13 tmc feet of water. In case of monsoon failure the existing distribution of water will continue and the tail end areas will be covered through tankers," said Mr Roy.

Metro Waterwboard also instructed the engineers to ensure that there is no pilferage of water during distribution and also effectively campaign for rainwater harvesting as intermittent rains will help to recharge the depleting groundwater, a senior metro water engineer said.

Though city has received mild showers in the past five weeks there is hardly any inflow in to the four major reservoirs that caters to Chennai leaving the total storage capacity to an all-time low of less than one per cent of the total 11 tmc feet capacity, the official said.