The initial phase of this year’s southwest monsoon has yielded a bountiful flow not only into the Mettur dam but also into many other reservoirs in the Cauvery and Parambikulam-Aliyar Project (PAP) basins. Ten major irrigation reservoirs have higher water levels than what they had on the corresponding day last year.
On Saturday morning, the level at Mettur, the lifeline of the Cauvery delta for irrigation and drinking water requirements, stood a little less than the full level of 120 ft. The storage was 92.343 thousand million cubic feet (tmc ft) against the capacity of 93.47 tmc ft. The dam recorded an inflow of around 1.19 lakh cubic feet per second (cusecs). On the same day a year ago, the level was 47 feet lower. The storage was 34.6 tmc ft.
Bhavanisagar, which comes next to Mettur in terms of storage, has 25.344 tmc ft against its capacity of 32.8 tmc ft. This was marginally higher than the storage exactly a year ago. At that time, the storage was around 24.84 tmc ft. On Saturday morning, the inflow was around 21,000 cusecs. Amaravathi, also in the Cauvery basin, was almost full with the storage being 3.91 tmc ft against the capacity of 4.047 tmc ft. Last year, it had almost one- and-a-half tmc ft less than what it has now.
As for the PAP basin, the main reservoir, Parambikulam, has 12.14 tmc ft, which was 1.3 tmc ft short of the capacity. Last year, the storage was about one half of the present. On Saturday morning, the reservoir registered an inflow of around 6,000 cusecs and it was a matter of days that excess water would have to be discharged, if the present trend of inflow continued. The other key dam, Aliyar, was fast getting filled, with the storage being 2.67 tmc ft (capacity: 3.864 tmc ft). Last year, it had around 1.6 tmc ft only. On Saturday morning, the reservoir received around 2,740 cusecs. Another important reservoir, Sholayar, was full. In fact, the current level exceeded the full level of 160 feet and all the inflow of around 6.6 cusecs was being discharged through the river.
The Mullaperiyar dam, located in Idukki district of Kerala but owned, operated and maintained by Tamil Nadu, reached the level of 135 feet, seven ft lower than the permissible level. Its storage was 5.866 tmc ft as against the allowable limit of 7.666 tmc ft. The dam registered an inflow of 6,700 cusecs, whereas nearly 1, 870 cusecs was being drawn through the tunnel.
As on July 14, the realisation of Cauvery water, as recorded at Billigundulu, was 30.6 tmc ft in the one-and-a-half months since the water year began on June 1. The prescribed quantum for the elapsed period was 14.1 tmc ft. As of now, the excess quantum was 16.5 tmc ft.
