500 million cubic feet of water to be released from Mettur to Chennai
Posted on: 02/Apr/2019 10:26:59 AM
The superb piece of news that would make many Chennai people very happy is the state government has decided to provide Chennai city with extra supply of around 500 mcft of Cauvery water. On Sunday night, a portion of this water was released from the Mettur dam. It is now said that this water would reach Veeranam tank in Cuddalore in another10 to 12 days of time.
It is well known that the city of Chennai has been facing severe water shortage and people are finding it tough. The shocking information is less than 700 mcft of water is only present in all the 4 reservoirs now. It is now brought out that the release of Cauvery water comes at a right time when the Chennai city is under the water crisis.
According to the officials it is now clear that the supply of extra water would last till the month of July and quarries, mines, agricultural fields, desalination plants etc would act as additional water resources. Sufficient water from the Mettur dam has been distributed for irrigation purposes. The remaining 29 to 30 tmcft has been kept in the reserve to supply drinking water for the people belonging to TN. This was later confirmed by the officials belonging to WRD or Water Resources Department. Information gathered is on Monday the present level in the Veeranam tank that was 589 mcft would be doubled by this additional supply of water.
On Monday night, 6000 cusecs of water was released and it is now said that in a week 1000 to 1300 cusecs of water would reach the Veeranam tank. By middle of the month of April, there would be gradual increase in the supply of water and Veeranam tank would reach its full capacity of 1465 mcft. This was later confirmed by the officials. From Mettur Dam the water would be released and this water would reach the lower anaicut and then flow into vadava channel and finally reach Veeranam.
The important information collected is 74 cusecs of water is pumped into Porur Lake after treatment at the Vadakuthu treatment plant and this supply of water could be increased slightly also when required. This has been confirmed by the official. On Monday, the reservoirs were bone dry and the combined level of all the 4 reservoirs stood at 686 mcft. This is just 6% of the full capacity. It is now known that Metro Water has started to draw 100 MLD of water from the Red Hills.
