CSE REPORT FINDINGS

GRIM WATER CRISIS IN BENGALURU

Bengaluru's water crisis

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Are Indian cities heading the Cape Town way?

PUNE MUST AVOID CAPE TOWN-LIKE SITUATION

THE CAPE TOWN CRISIS

Cape Town's dwindling supply

A water dam north of Cape Town is almost empty (AFP Photo)

WORLD WATER FORUM OPENS

World Water Forum 2018 (AFP Photo)

NATURE-BASED SOLUTIONS

NEW DELHI: Bengaluru is one of the 10 metropolitan cities besides Cape Town that is fast moving towards ‘Day Zero’ - a situation when taps start running dry.Ahead of World Water Day being observed today, an analysis by Down To Earth, a magazine published by green think-tank Centre for Science and Environment, showed that at least 200 cities globally are facing a serious water crisis.Sounding the alarm bells, Sunita Narain, director general of CSE, said, “Be it Cape Town, Bengaluru or Chennai, there isn’t much difference between these cities. They are all witnessing a common present. The important question to ask is whether these cities can create and move toward a common future that is water secure because it is water wise.”The report analysed the findings of several global studies on water use and availability of resources and noted that 36% of the cities across the world will face a water crisis by 2050 and the urban water demand is expected to go up by a whopping 80% from the current level by 2050.Some 400 million people live in cities with a perennial water shortage, and the number is expected to go up to an alarming one billion by 2050.Besides Bengaluru, the list of 10 cities facing ‘Day Zero’ include Beijing (China), Mexico City (Mexico), Sanaa (Yemen), Nairobi (Kenya), Istanbul (Turkey), Sao Paulo (Brazil), Karachi (Pakistan), Buenos Aires (Argentina) and Kabul (Afghanistan).Experts say Bengaluru is on the verge of an imminent water crisis, with the city’s water table shrinking massively in just two decades. The city could follow Cape Town to become the first Indian city to run out of water unless urgent measures are taken.“Recharge of groundwater is minimal due to unplanned urbanisation. The city only uses half of its treatment capacity to treat the waste and as a result a substantial amount of waste is dumped into the water bodies,” according to the Down To Earth report."There is a severe scarcity of water here," said 30-year-old Nagraj, who moved to the suburban neighbourhood of Panathur a decade ago and has seen it transformed by rampant construction."The future will be very difficult. It is impossible to imagine how they will find water, how they will live. Even if we dig 1,500 feet (450 metres) down, we are not getting water."Once known as India's garden city for its lush green parks, Bangalore was built around a series of lakes created to form rainwater reservoirs and prevent the precious resource from draining away.Many have now been concreted over to build apartment blocks with names like Dream Acres and Strawberry Fields to house those who have flocked here during India's outsourcing boom.Many of the lakes that remain are heavily polluted. Bellandur has become so toxic it spontaneously catches fire, and emits clouds of white froth so large authorities have had to build barriers to keep it from spilling onto the road."The city is dying," said T V Ramachandra, an ecologist with the Indian Institute of Science."If the current trend of growth and urbanisation is allowed (to continue), by 2020, 94 percent of the landscape will be concretised,” he added.Most of the city's municipal water is supplied by the Cauvery river, whose waters flow through Karnataka and neighbouring Tamil Nadu before emptying into the Bay of Bengal, and have been bitterly disputed for more than a century.Two years ago, an order to release extra water from the river to ease a shortage threatening crops in Tamil Nadu sparked deadly protests in Bangalore that forced hundreds of companies to close.Last month the Supreme Court stepped in, altering the river-sharing arrangement in Karnataka's favour citing Bangalore's dire need.Ecologist Ramachandra, meanwhile, said Bangalore has enough annual rainfall to provide water for its estimated 10 million people without resorting to borewells or rivers -- if only it could harvest the resource more effectively."If there is a water crisis, we should not think about river diversion. We should think about how to retain the water," he said, blaming "fragmented, uncoordinated governance" for the crisis.Bengaluru is not the only Indian city that has to reason to worry. In Pune, an institutional approach, instead of an individual one, is required to preserve its water.“Think of water crisis and the first thing that comes to mind is Cape Town, or perhaps Bangalore. These cities are facing an acute water crisis as their groundwater tables have dropped rapidly. Cities depend on annual average rainfall and natural resources for their water requirements. In Pune, we receive an annual average rainfall of 750mm. We have five rivers, of which two have run dry and three have been reduced to sewage lines,” said Col Shashikant Dalvi (retd), the founder of Parjanya, that does rainwater harvesting in the city.“Newly-developed areas of Baner, Balewadi and Vimannagar are already facing an acute water scarcity. There is no mechanism for groundwater recharge. The time has come to identify problems, make communities responsible,” said Suneel Joshi, convenor of Jal Biradari, Pune.He also raised the issue of landfilling, which leads to water contamination. “The polluted water travels to Ujani dam, affecting the people staying in 28 rural areas. There is an urgent need for knowledge sharing and sensitization of people at all levels. We need continuous education about water and its management at school and college levels,” Joshi added.“We are water-illiterate people who do not understand the concept of water footprint. Groundwater Surveys and Development Agency in Pune had undertaken a study to map the aquifer quality and quantity in Pune, but this report was never put in the public domain. There are areas where groundwater should not increase and others where rooftop rainwater harvesting is necessary,” said Vijay Paranjpye, managing trustee of Gomukh Trust.Alarm bells began ringing around the world when Cape Town announced it was running out of water. One of the richest cities of Africa, it could soon have no water. Many reports have estimated that the city’s taps will run dry this year, possibly by July-August.In 2014, Cape Town’s prized dams stood full after several years of substantial rainfall. Inf act, C40, a group of cities focused on climate change worldwide, had in 2015 awarded Cape Town its ‘adaptation implementation’ prize for water management.A three-year drought, however, meant the the situation took a 360 degree turn, forcing South Africa's second city to slash residential water consumption by more than 60%.The water crisis has hit this popular tourist city hard and fast. To deal with the crisis, the city introduced the idea of ‘Day Zero’ in a bid to substantially cut water use.The term “Day Zero’ was thus coined to mark the day the city was expected to run out of water. The date was first marked as June 4, however, strict rationing pushed the date to July 9. Earlier this month Cape Town officials said that if no rainfall comes then "Day Zero", when the taps are predicted to run dry, would be pushed back to August 27 from July 9, and that the bullet could be dodged completely this year."Provided we continue our current water savings efforts, Day Zero can be avoided completely this year," the city’s deputy mayor said in a statement."The city now projects that, if there was to be no rainfall, Day Zero would arrive on 27 August 2018. As this date falls deep within the normal rainfall period, it is no longer appropriate to project the date without any consideration of rainfall," the statement added.Increased water saving by residents was responsible for the date being postponed, according to officials of this city of four million people. It said provincial farmers who released a large amount of water from private dams to help the city also contributed.Officials insist the city’s residents must continue to regulate the use of treated water. Residents must use less than 50 litres (13.2 gallons) per person daily to avoid total depletion - less than one-sixth of what the average citizen uses.In addition, the city is setting up 200 emergency water stations outside groceries. Each will have to serve 20,000 residents.Even as the world grapples with this crisis, the United Nations has warned that some 5.7 billion people may run short of drinking water by 2050.In the backdrop of this dire warning, the 8th World Water Forum is presently being held in Brazil, bringing together 15 heads of state and government, 300 mayors and dozens of experts. In total, an estimated 40,000 people were expected to attend.Brazil's President Michel Temer’s opening remarks made it evident the world was taking the matter seriously. “There is simply no time to lose,” he warned.The main focus was on the specter of supplies collapsing in major urban centers, as almost happened in Cape Town this year."This is the consensus," Brazil’s president remarked. "Life on earth is threatened if we don't respect nature's limits."The forum comes in the wake United Nations’ 2018 World Water Development Report, which said 3.6 billion people, or half the world's population, already live in areas where water can be scarce at least one month a year. That could rise to 5.7 billion people by 2050, the report said.In an example of how nature-based practices do help, New York has protected the three largest watersheds that supply water to the city since the late 1990s through forest preservation programmes and paying farmers to be environmentally friendly."Disposing of the largest unfiltered water supply in the US, the city now saves more than $300 million yearly on water sea treatment and maintenance costs," the UN noted.China's "Sponge City" project is another example of of how water availability could be improved. By 2020, China plans to build 16 pilot projects across the country with the aim of recycling 70 percent of rainwater through greater soil permeation, retention and storage, water purification and restoration of adjacent wetlands."These solutions are cost-effective" and not more expensive than traditional systems, according to the UN.It also pointed to estimates that global agricultural production could increase by about 20 percent with greener water management practices.In addition to improving water availability and quality, "it is possible to increase agricultural production per hectare with better water management" and thus feed more people, said Stefan Uhlenbrook, program coordinator at the UN World Water Assessment Forum."Green" infrastructure also helps fight erosion, drought and flood risks while boosting soil quality and vegetation.And indigenous peoples could be involved in implementation, something which was not the case in "grey" infrastructure," the report said.However, only marginal use was being made of such nature-based solutions. "Accurate figures are not available", but investments in these techniques "appear to be less than one percent... of total investment in infrastructure and water resource management," according to the report.