Four reservoirs in city have enough storage till June
Making use of three 60-hp pumps, the dead storage water in Choolavaram reservoir is being pumped into a canal linked to the Red Hills reservoir (Photo: DC)
Chennai: Even as the water level in city’s reservoirs is falling rapidly, Andhra Pradesh has stopped discharging Krishna water to Chennai from Kandaleru reservoir as it plummeted close to dead storage level. The Krishna water supply was stopped at a time when the combined storage of Poondi, Red Hills, Chembarambakkam and Cholavaram reservoirs stands at 2.36 thousand million cubic feet as against its total storage capacity of 11.057 tmc ft. AP suspended Krishna water to the city three days ago.
“The storage in the four reservoirs will be enough to meet water requirement till June,” a water resources department official said, adding that since April 11 the state has received 0.6 tmcft of Krishna water when Andhra Pradesh resumed its supply. The state was expected to receive 1.6 tmcft of water in this spell. During the 43rd liaison meeting held in January, the Andhra Pradesh government had agreed to release three tmcft.
However, city received only 1.3 tmcft till March 21, after which the supply was suspended. The state has so far received 5.35 tmcft of Krishna water as against 12 tmcft of water to be supplied between July and April under the Telugu Ganga project.The Poondi reservoir which receives Krishna water has already reached dead storage level. Since the storage of water in Poondi would result in evaporation, the water in reservoir being transferred to Chembarambakkam and Red Hills, said a WRD official.
However, due to monsoon failure and poor water storage in reservoirs, the Chennai metro water is supplying drinking water to the residents on alternate days at the rate of 600 million litres a day (MLD) as against the city’s daily water requirement is 830 MLD a day. “We are meeting 600 MLD requirement by sourcing 180 MLD water from Veeranam tank, 200 MLD from two desalination plants in Minjur and Nemmeli and the balance from city reservoirs,” said a metro water official.
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