Global warming is no more a bad dream. The rise in average temperature, the changing rainfall pattern, the falling ground water table, the drying source of surface water, the de-forestation, the urbanization spree and the pollution are today’s realities. We have had enough of nature’s endowment; probably time has come for us to face its onslaught too.
Is drying source of water a form of nature’s assault? Are trickling taps at our homes a nature’s reprimand or an effect of mismanagement of resources on our part? Whatever the answers may be, the fact is our halcyon days gifted by the valley’s ecosystem are no longer there and we are facing the consequences. Merely an hour of water supply in every 5 days! 1,000 liters of water per household per five days, which if prorated will give us just over 30 liters per head per day assuming a family of six, whereas the World Health Organization’s standard calls for 100 liters per head per day. The condition often becomes appalling with households renting out each of its rooms as small as 100 square feet as full-fledged apartments. The rationing logically trickles down to few liters per person per day. With demand increasing, source of water depleting and distribution system crumbling each year, we are yet to experience the worst. It is a fact that all of us are pre-occupied by political agendas and as such the infrastructure development probably is at the bottom of our priority list today. The chances of getting ambitious water supply projects commissioned look remote, if not impossible for at least few more years to come. Under these circumstances of growing demand and depleting supply, the city dwellers are forced to take recourse to produce and conserve water on their own or resort to exodus – which sounds unusual in the 21st century but may actually take place, given the dire circumstances.
Under these circumstances of growing demand and depleting supply, Kathmandu city dwellers are forced to take recourse to produce and conserve water on their own or resort to exodus – which sounds unusual in the 21st century but may actually take place, given the dire circumstances.
The mushrooming “Water Stations” in our neighborhoods is a proof of the worsening water supply condition. It appears to me that the entrepreneurs who are in this business are smarter than those in gasoline business. With an investment of merely 100,000 rupees to buy several PVC tanks, they are exploiting the scarcity-ridden market and milking in easy money selling the so-called “potable” water for a rupee a liter. The frequent scenes of people storming around water tankers reminds of war-torn African nations.
The haves of Kathmandu wait for weeks to get a tanker of water delivered to their homes at as much as Rs.2,000 per 8,000 liter – the source and quality of which no one knows. However, stockpiling this “precious” supply needs construction of underground RCC reservoir tank and a separate distribution system. Economically speaking, the underground tank with a capacity of about 10,000 liters will cost about Rs 200,000, the pump Rs 4,000 and the overhead tank Rs 9,000 – for a total outlay of about Rs 2, 13,000, the cost of investment at 15 percent per annum being Rs 2,700 a month. The operating cost cannot be less than Rs 300 a month with 1.5HP pump running for at least an hour a day. The expenses when added together comes to Rs 7, 500 per month for a family of six. If one decides to put in some more capital investment, a shallow well can be dug at an estimated cost of about Rs 20,000 fitted with a lift pump costing Rs 3,500 which adds Rs 300 more to the cost of investment. If operating costs and basic water treatment costs are to be considered, this will require about Rs 1,000 more. This scheme with one’s own source of water will fetch about Rs 4,000 a month which is Rs 48,000 a year. Thus, the price of water we drink turns out to be more expensive than anywhere else in the world.
Records show that the average rainfall in Kathmandu Valley is approximately 1,900mm over an estimated catchment area of 640 sq km, which means we get a total of 1.2 billion cu. meter of rain water. This when prorated will give us over 3,000 Million Liters Per Day (MLD) of water whereas our daily demand is merely 280MLD. If we manage to use the rain water wisely, we can easily fill the shortage of over 194MLD. However, devising a system to harvest millions of liters of rain water is certainly not an easy and cheap task. On the other hand, we cannot ignore the fact that each penny we spend and every effort we make individually to fetch a liter of water today, if pooled in can be substantially huge and may be good enough to work out a system to tap this unconventional source of water to quench our ever-increasing thirst.
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