Thanks to intermittent rain in its catchment area, the Peppara dam is close to its full-reservoir mark.
On Sunday, the water level at the dam crossed the 107-metre mark. The full-reservoir level is 107.5 metres. This is 1.5 metres more than the level recorded the same time last year. According to a Kerala Water Authority (KWA) executive engineer, this translates to six months of water for the city. In August, the water level at Peppara plummeted to 98 metres; this meant a water supply of 75 days to the city. Back then the KWA was staring a full-blown drinking water crisis in the face. Had that happened, the authority would have had to reimpose rationing of water supply to the city, done for the first time in 2017. The rationing was executed by throttling control valves in the city’s distribution system. Moreover, additional water was pumped over from the Neyyar dam and a pumping facility installed on a war footing at Kappukadu. Many engineers of the KWA have, for long, warned that bringing over water from the Neyyar dam is not a long-term solution to the city’s water supply situation.
