Northeast monsoon: Sharp rains raise Tamil Nadu reservoirs to 63% of storage

CHENNAI: The storage in the 90 reservoirs in Tamil Nadu has increased by 5.86 percentage points since October 10, adding 19.126 thousand million cubic feet (tmc) of water to the cumulative storage of the reservoirs.

Since the onset of the northeast monsoon, water levels in the reservoirs have been steadily rising due to intermittent sharp showers across many parts of the Tamil Nadu, noted officials from the Water Resources Department.

As of Sunday morning, the overall water storage level in the 90 reservoirs in the State has increased to 141.992 tmc, which is 63.31 per cent of the total capacity of 224.297 tmc.

The largest reservoir in Tamil Nadu, the Stanley reservoir in Mettur, currently holds 60.896 tmc of water. It works out to 65.15 per cent of its full storage capacity of 93.470 tmc.

The reservoir recorded an inflow of 15,929 cubic feet per second (cusecs) of Cauvery water from upstream and discharged 3,000 cusecs into the canal for irrigation and 300 cusecs downstream into the Cauvery to maintain ecological balance, according to the WRD report on Sunday morning.

Among the remaining reservoirs, three in the Coimbatore region, which has 24 reservoirs, have filled up. They are Varattupallam (139.60 mcft), Gunderipallam (108.21 mcft), and Varadhamanthi (110.90 mcft). The Gundar reservoir (18.43 mcft) in Madurai region is also brimming with water.

Among the remaining reservoirs, 18 have exceeded 80 per cent of their capacity, while several others are nearing their optimum storage levels.