The Hindu 20.12.2010
Meters soon to gauge water wastage
| Board to install them at section levels to measure quantum of supply made to a location |
Hyderabad: Not a day passes without a pipeline breaking down somewhere or the other. Often there is a criminal waste of precious water as it gushes out for hours before the leak is plugged.
Interestingly, the water board has no idea how much water is lost due to leakages. As per international standards the transmission and leakage losses should not exceed 15 per cent. Presently the water board is able to account for only 50 per cent of the water supplied.
Accountability
Authorities have now decided to bring some kind of accountability. Meters are proposed to be installed at section levels to measure the quantum of supplies made to a particular geographical location. Government has given its nod to the Rs. 75 crore project to be executed on Build Own Operate and Transfer (BOOT) basis.
Shortly the water board will invite Expression of Interest followed by floating of tenders. In the next six months the meters will be hopefully installed in all the 100 sections in the 16 Operation & Maintenance Divisions. These special kind of meters will send hourly signals to the central server at the head office using mobile technology.
“Once this is done we can pinpoint the losses due to leakage, transmission and illegal tapping”, said water board Managing Director M. Jagadeeshwar.
Huge network
Water pipelines criss-cross the twin cities to an amazing distance of 6780 kilometres. It is not unusual, authorities feel, that leakages should occur in such a huge network now and then.
The pipes burst mostly due to two reasons – old age and lack of preventive maintenance.
Hyderabad boasts of pipelines as old as 1920 to 2007. Most of them are cement pipes prone to leak at slightest pressure.
Major leakages occur mostly on the Singur-Manjira system. The Manjira phase I line is laid in 1965 and phase II in 1981 while the Singur phase I and phase II lines are laid in 1991 and 1993 respectively. The Krishna phase I which has pre-stressed cement pipes are also bursting quite frequently.
The pipelines which carry the Osmansagar and Himayatsagar water from the filter points are laid as far back as 1921 and develop leaks frequently. There are other factors like ‘back hammer effect' when power suddenly goes off during pumping and the water gushes back damaging pipes.
The water board, which is operating at 100 per cent capacity, has little time to take up preventive maintenance. As against the requirement of 440 mgd only 340 mgd is being supplied and it is difficult to shut down supplies, it is said.
Replacement of the pipeline is the best bet. But it calls for huge budget. With great difficulty the water board has replaced 122 km of the 591 km pipeline identified in the wake of the Bholakpur tragedy to check pollution. This project costs Rs. 1157 crore.
