Anantapur: Even as inflows have reduced, the Tungabhadra dam recorded an enhanced storage at 86.88tmc-ft on Monday as against the gross storage capacity of 105tmc-ft.
Though about 35tmc-ft of water went waste due to damage to the 18th gate of the reservoir, the storage increased in the past one week. There was only 74tmc-ft at the time of fixing the stop log in place of the 18th gate.
The dam got 12tmc-ft of additional storage along with outflows of 10.075 cusecs towards the HLMC, LLC and other distributor canals in AP and Karnataka.Dam engineers said the total yield the present season was 298tmc-ft while it was only 99tmc-ft last year and the 10-year-average yield was 183.72tmc-ft.
“We have been releasing water through the high level main canal and low level canal since the second week of July, based on allocations by the board. The situation was worse last year and there was no assured water release for paddy cultivation then,” a senior official from TB dam said.
On Monday, the inflow to the reservoir was only 17,311 cusecs, due to less rainfall in the upstream areas. The dam would get full storage if there is heavy rainfall in the catchment areas in the present season, the TB board said.
The high level main canal’s superintendent engineer Rajasekhar said the water released to the HLMC towards Anantapur is stored at the Penna Ahobilam balancing reservoir, the Mid-Pennar and also the connected summer storage tanks, to meet irrigation and drinking water requirements.
The KC Canal also got a quota from HLMC to meet the drinking needs of Kurnool and other parts, he said.
