Metro Water pins hopes on farm borewells in Tiruvallur

Sources in the Board said, with the water level in the lakes drastically declining, officials already floated a tender for tapping water in 400 agricultural borewells. In the first phase, the contracting agency has identified around 270 borewells. The tapped water would be used for filling water tanks placed in open areas, as there is a possibility for more residents to buy water by paying money. 

“Borewells located near Palar and Kosasthalaiyar have been identified and we have taken water samples to ensure quality. Moreover, we are inspecting many borewells in the villages of neighbouring Tiruvallur district and water will be tapped from February month, as the existing water level in the lakes can meet the need of drinking water only for this month,” said an CMWSSB official. 

On the other hand, the officials were in the process of carrying out repairing works of damaged water tanks placed in open places in the city. “Cyclone Vardah damaged a large number of water tanks in the city and it prompted us to take up such works. We will also explore the possibility to place around 1,000 more water tanks in many parts of the city for public use,” said a senior engineer. The Board has been gearing up to tap water from borewells in the peripheral areas coming under the Corporation limit. 

“Though ground water level in the city is taking a steady dip, we already started inspecting public borewells. We also observed many borewells are not being maintained well and our workers will undertake desilting and renovation works soon,” the official said and added that they would apply corrective measures to manage the water crisis on a war-footing.

Andhra Pradesh government has released Krishna water from Kandaleru reservoir on Monday evening. This piece of communication to PWD officials from their AP counterparts brought cheers to water managers of Chennai city. A total of 1,000 cusecs of water was released around 7 pm, said the AP officials. An engineer said “AP has 13 tmc of water under Telugu Ganga Project, they could release water if their storage is up to 8 tmc.” Metro Water officials said “If we get at least 2 tmc of Krishna water we can mitigate the water scarcity till the month of April. The release of Krishna water has given us hope that we can tackle summer.” Andhra Pradesh has as so far released 1 tmc of water.