Water has been trickling into reservoirs following rains this week. As a result, Metro water officials are pinning their hopes on a good monsoon to ensure total piped supply of water for the city.
“The rains in the last couple of days have reversed the trend of declining levels of water in reservoir. Although the flow of water into the reservoir is not that substantial, it is a welcome trend,” a Metro Water official said.
The rains have added nearly 400 to 500 cusecs of water and with the overcast sky, Metro Water officials are positive that things will improve. Chembarambakkam has received nearly 219 cusecs of water while other reservoirs got some additional water due to the rains, Metro Water sources said.
With the storage levels around 1,138 million cubic feet of water, Chennai Metro Water is not taking things easy. It still has its contingency plans on to ensure that the city’s residents don’t go thirsty. “We are currently plying 3,894 lorries to ensure that residents don’t go thirsty,” the source said.
Metro water officials said that currently they’re also hoping for a substantial supply, as the Krishna water trickles in. The supply of Krishna water had been plagued by problems since the beginning of the month due to leakages in Kandaleru-Poondi canal at Ubbalamadugu in Andhra Pradesh.
With Andhra Pradesh government’s Irrigation and Command Area Development Department officials relaying the concrete, there is hope that Water Resources Department officials won’t face any further headache. Currently, Poondi reservoir is getting around 170 cusecs of water.
“Although the quantum of release from Kandaleru Reservoir may be high, the water is also used by other people, and there is also evaporation to contend with, so the supply will be reduced slightly,” Metro Water sources said.
Currently, the city has about 1.1 tmc feet of water of which 0.8tmc feet is dead storage. As such the city only has 0.3 tmc feet of water to cater to Chennai’s thirst before the arrival of the North-East monsoon.