The Mettur dam, the primary storage point of Cauvery water in the State, is likely to soon witness a steep rise in inflow with the authorities in Karnataka beginning to release huge quantities of water from Kabini dam.
At 4 p.m. on Wednesday, the dam, which recorded an inflow of 35,000 cubic feet per second (cusecs), saw an outflow of around 40,000 cusecs.
On Tuesday, the outflow from the dam was around 30,000 cusecs. As of now, Mettur dam has recorded an inflow of 3,600 cusecs.
Heavy rain in the last few days in Kabini’s catchment area at Wayanad in Kerala led to huge inflows into the dam in Karnataka.
Another development that comes as a relief to water managers of Tamil Nadu is that parts of the Cauvery’s catchment area in south interior Karnataka have also been recording substantial amounts of rain.
Unlike Kabini dam, which has reached around 90% of capacity, the Krishnaraja Sagar (KRS) dam’s figure is around 60% and, as such, the chances of release of excess water from the dam are remote for the next few days.
The inflow into the KRS dam was around 20,000 cusecs.
As of Wednesday, Mettur dam’s storage stood at 27.88 thousand million cubic feet (tmc ft), as against a capacity of 93.47 tmc ft.
The water level stood at 64.16 ft, as against the full level of 120 ft. The discharge was 3,000 cusecs.
