Bangalore and It's Water Crisis!

[Biplob Chatterjee]

Bangalore faces an interesting predicament. The city gets 660 million cubic meter of water through rains annually. The aquifers provide 90 million cu m. Cauvery reservoirs provide 490 million cu m. Of these, Bangalore recycles about only 80 million cu m of water annually. These annual supplies total about 1.3 billion cu m. 

The city’s daily requirement is about 1.5 million cu m for humans and some for greens.  That the city is unable to recycle the most recyclable commodity available to it, describes the entire story.

Bangalore drains, waste, evapo-transpirate about 70% of the annual water supply! The city has enough water supply, only if it manages its supplies appropriately. This poor management extends to Bangalore’s horribly over-exploited / mined aquifers, with minimal recharge, thus dwindling these to near permanency.  Most of the lakes and fresh water bodies in the city receive untreated sewer and are atrociously polluted!  

Sadly most cities, big or small, in the country today, have a very similar tragic water story to describe. 

Geovale Services is working on water security for end-users in India. We believe that the supply risks can be mitigated by scientific understanding along with careful planning, good stakeholder management practices and technology.   

[Susan Sharma]

The predicament of Gurgaon is not very different

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEaGXHFR95o

[Biplob Chatterjee]

You are absolutely right, Susan! 

That's a lovely video you have created.

We have worked quite a bit in Gurgaon in last year or so, for the water security requirements of some large establishments. 

We were horrified to see that water level has gone down by over 30 m in some parts of Gurgaon district in last 10 years. There is intense, non-regulated competition for ground water. This competition to draw ground water is way above the aquifer capacity. Very poor water recycling, harvesting, surface water storage and aquifer recharge.

We definitely need to bring in serious amount of regulation for aquifer tapping, much stringent than what CGWA's NOCAP suggests (which incidentally is being opposed by Industry bodies - !!).

And we need to work on water management at watershed level, based on solid high quality science and modern technological applications.   

Susan Sharma said:

The predicament of Gurgaon is not very different

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEaGXHFR95o