The city’s households spend a minimum of 3% of their monthly income
towards water, particularly during drought conditions, to cope with the
shortfall in piped water supply.

With the growing gap between
demand and water availability, it is essential to have a water budget
and develop a sustainable drainage system during urban planning, experts
stressed here recently.

At a media workshop on ‘Floods, cyclone
and drought: The puzzle of Chennai’s water and climate’, organised by
Care Earth Trust, K.S. Kavi Kumar of Madras School of Economics said
many households with piped water connection spend Rs. 553 per month
towards water needs. Those without piped water supply spend Rs. 658 per
month on the same.

People without municipal water supply spend
nearly 6.2% of their monthly income towards sourcing water from the
private sector. Citing various studies, he said besides implementing
water metering system, the government sector must change the pricing
strategy.

At present, the cost of water supply is nearly Rs. 13-15
per kilo litre. Economic incentives may be provided to encourage
reduction in water use.

The
need to increase the reservoirs’ capacity and boost groundwater recharge
was also underlined during the workshop. Pointing out that the water
demand of the expanding city is projected to increase to 2003 million
litres by 2021, Balaji Narasimhan, Associate Professor, Department of
Civil Engineering, IIT Madras, said it is imperative to restore
waterbodies and demarcate their boundaries to store flood water. During
land-use planning, it is essential to identify land to store excess
runoff along with allocation of OSR land, he added.

Speakers also
highlighted the recent extreme weather events due to climate change and
emphasised the importance of restoration of wetlands as part of disaster
management. While Uma Ramachandran of IFMR-LEAD spoke on how innovative
methods were used in various sectors to help residents during December
2015 floods, Avantika Bhaskar of Care Earth Trust, spoke on the role of
wetlands in storing floodwater and ensuring better groundwater quality.

Workshop on city’s water supply situation underlines the need to increase the reservoir capacity