Even as the Kerala Water Authority prepares to install the two submersible pumps that arrived at Kappukad near the Neyyar dam on Tuesday, the Minister for Water Resources Mathew T. Thomas announced here that the round-the-clock pumping of water from Aruvikkara would continue for a day more.
Mr. Thomas told The Hindu that two dredgers and two 100 HP pumps brought to Kaappukad from the KWA facility at observatory hill were functioning full throttle. “Though there is electricity at Kaapukad, we could not pump water from 6 p.m. as it was the peak demand time for power. Later, I saw the dredgers and pumps switched on. The two pumps from Gujarat may be installed by May 6,” Mr. Thomas explained. A decision on rationing pumping of water from Aruvikkara may be taken on Wednesday, he added.
Once the two dredgers, the two pumps from the city and those from Gujarat become operational, the KWA would be able to pump 114 mld (million litres a day) of water to the Aruvikkara reservoir. This is about half the amount of water that is produced daily at this KWA facility. However, not all this water would reach Aruvikkara. Primarily this is due to groundwater seepage along the route the water takes to Aruvikkara. Moreover, there are five KWA schemes whose intake wells are situated in the path of the water from Kaapukad to Aruvikkara. These schemes are expected to see a surge in availability of water.
A senior KWA engineer told The Hindu that there would be a 15 to 20 percent reduction in water by the time it reaches Aruvikkara from Kaappukad. So, in effect, Aruvikkara would get 90 to 100 mld once all the pumps and dredgers are working.
“We should be able to tide this crisis over with the water from Neyyar dam. Once rains reach the catchment areas of Peppara, we may not need all this water from Neyyar,” the engineer added.
