After a month without Krishna water, Chennai will once again receive regular supply by early August when Andhra Pradesh will resume the release of water.
The State had recently written to the Andhra Pradesh government requesting speedy release of water from the Kandaleru reservoir to rejuvenate the fast-depleting city reservoirs. At present, the reservoirs, including Veeranam tank in Cuddalore district, which supply Chennai, have only 2,500 million cubic feet of water, far below its capacity. The available resources can ensure drinking water supply till October.
“We need Krishna water to step up the storage in the reservoirs. It may take four days for the water to travel up to Poondi reservoir. We expect to receive at least 400-500 cubic feet per second of water. Part of this will be provided as water to the city,” said an official of Water Resources Department.
Since May last year, Chennai Metrowater has reduced the daily water supply from 810 million litres a day to a volume ranging between 585- 610 mld for want of resources. As the rains so far have not been adequate in filling the reservoirs, Krishna water will be a lifeline for the city.
The WRD is repairing canals that transport water to various reservoirs to enable storage of Krishna water that was due to be released in early July. Besides removing silt, work is in progress for concretising the link canal that runs for 25 km between Poondi and Chembarambakkam reservoirs, to prevent loss of water.
The department is also expediting the project to create additional storage in Nemam tank located close to Chembarambakkam to store Krishna water.
With a water spread area of over 1,000 hectares, Nemam tank is being desilted to be used as another drinking water source for Chennai.
A new channel from the link canal is also being formed to transport water. Work is also in progress to increase the tank’s capacity from 257 million cubic feet (mcft) to 577 mcft, which equals half a month’s water requirement of city.
Desilting work is progressing at a slow pace as environmental clearance is being provided in a phased manner. The project will be completed by March next year, officials added.