Monday, July 13, 2015

OPEN WELL VISIT OF YAMALUR WATERSHED

The open wells are important structures to understand the ground water of any place for that matter. One can actually connect between the ground water to the surface through the means of open wells. Today, in the time where bore wells are dominating for the extraction of ground water, not many appreciate the importance of an open well. Many wells in the city today are dry but a few wells near Rayasandra kere of Yamalur watershed still yield water and have been maintained beautifully. One of the important tasks in mapping the aquifer of a watershed is to understand the past of that aquifer and this can be achieved by thoroughly studying the open wells of that area. About 21 wells have been identified in Yamalur watershed off Sarjapura road out of which only 2 are yielding. It is important to understand why the other wells have gone dry and what it takes to restore the wells which are not yielding. These dry wells are prone for permanent shut down and due to this, it is important to identify, conserve and restore them. 

A visit to these 21 wells identified in Yamalur watershed off Sarjapura road has been planned on Thursday, 16-7-2015. The schedule for the same is mentioned below.


9:00 – Reach Doddakannelli kere and visit 2 wells around it.

 
9:30 – Leave for Halanayakanahalli kere

9:45 – Visit 2 wells around Halanayakanahalli kere


10:15 – Leave for Hadosiddapura kere

10:30 – Visit 2 wells around Hadosiddapura kere (One needs to walk a bit to reach the wells from the car parking spot)


11:15 – Leave for Rayasandra kere

11:45 – Visit 3 wells around Rayasandra kere



12:15 – Leave for Choodasandra kere

12:30 – Reach Choodasandra kere and visit 2 wells around it

13:00 – Leave for lunch near Kaikondrahalli kere

14:00 – Leave for Chikka kudlu kere

14:15 – Reach Chikka Kudlu kere and visit 4 wells near it.



 
 
15:15 – Leave for Parappana Agrahara kere

15:30 – Reach Parappana Agrahara kere and visit 6 wells around it (One should walk a bit to reach the wells from the car parking spot)


 

The trip would come to an end after visiting the wells of Parappana Agrahara kere. People who are interested are most welcome to join but they have to arrange their own transport. The event, as according to the schedule, will be for the whole day as there are many wells and are spread across a huge area. It is advisable for the participants to wear shoes, bring a cap and water according to their needs.  

Thursday, July 2, 2015

My well, Our water: Year End Workshop

Background:

Urban India is grappling with multiple water management challenges. The groundwater abstraction is increasing day by day yet, our understanding of aquifers- logical unit for groundwater management- is very poor. To understand the nature of aquifers, water balance and most importantly demystify the science of groundwater for citizens by taking the learnings back to the citizens; an experiment was initiated in 2014 called Participatory Aquifer Mapping (PAQM) in Yamalur watershed. It’s been a year since the start and we thought it is time to share the learnings to the citizens and experts -who have been supportive throughout this year- to take their feedback and also to know from them on further process.

Agenda:

The agenda therefore was to share the learnings from the project so far and take feedback from different stakeholders as to how to proceed further. This was important to understand as the aim of the project is not to confine within the academic limits but bridge the gap by demystifying the science of groundwater.

Presentations:

The workshop started with P S Narayan, head of Wipro sustainability initiatives sharing his idea behind Wipro technologies partnering with this project and lending financial support for the initiative.

Dr. Himanshu Kulkarni from ACWADAM- project partner for PAQM- initiated the workshop with a presentation giving overview of groundwater aquifers in the country and the need for participation from citizens and governance institutions in collaboration for effective groundwater management. The presentation can be found here: Groundwater overview in India.

Avinash Krishnamurthy from Biome Environmental Trust, elaborated on the groundwater situation in Bengaluru to set the context of the Participatory Aquifer Mapping project (PAQM). The presentation can be found here: Catalysing a social response to manage groundwater.  The presentation highlighted the fact that in absence of formal institutional services, communities themselves be the champions by sustainably managing the groundwater. A community called Rainbow Drive  layout, located off Sarjapur road, has managed to close the water cycle loop by successfully managing the water within their campus.

Shubha Ramachandran from Biome Environmental Trust then elaborated on the process of aquifer mapping by describing the objectives, outcomes and outputs expected, data collection methods  as well as challenges encountered while collecting data. The detailed presentation can be found here: Process of aquifer mapping

The highlight of the event was indeed the citizen stories: Mr. Naganath Iyer from SJR redwoods shared his experience on the story of their borewell, Mr. Manjunath as an estate manager with Rainbow Drive, Mr. K P Singh from Rainbow drive on a layout's effort towards sustainable water management and lastly Mr. Muniyappa, a well digger from bovi community now involved in construction of recharge wells all across Bengaluru. The stories can be found here: People and Groundwater

The last set of presentation was sharing of interpreted results from the first year of the project. This was done by Kaustubh Mahamuni from ACWADAM. The detailed presentation can be found here: Interpretations of aquifer- interim results. The interim results so far show that the rock type in this region is mostly granite-which is of crystalline typology- with hard rock as a major constituent. Based on the geology it shows that the porosity is low in the region and hence recharging will take a long time as it'll only be through fractures and joints. Furthermore, the data shows that the borewells in the region are tapping water from confined aquifers i.e. at deeper depths where again the recharging becomes difficult.   

The presentation above were interspersed with Question and Answers so that a space is provided for interaction. This was moderated by S. Vishwanath from Biome Environmental Trust.

Mr. Ashwin Mahesh, founder of MapUnity and project partner lending support for developing software component of the project also spoke about knowledge sharing as the existing gap in the current urban scenario. The software component is developed with the intent of creating space for all to share their stories, discuss and engage in communication for knowledge development.  

Responses by participants during the workshop:

Prof. Mohan Kumar, IISc: While appreciating the effort of PAQM, he shed light on the journey of water abstraction from open wells to borewells and stated that it is required to move from borewell to dug well! Sharing his thoughts on recharging aquifer through treated waste water, he cautioned that there shouldn’t be direct recharge. The treated water should first be passed through soil barriers as an additional filter and then only after due care the treated water should be disposed into aquifers.

Sharad Lele, ATREE: He touched upon an important aspect in this exercise- what do we consider better groundwater management, how do we define best practice,, how is sustainability and equity addressed in the project? He suggested that these are some of the questions one should be aware of and should flag of normative concerns right in the beginning so that readers and viewers become aware.

CGWB: Dr. Sawkar from CGWB emphasized on the importance of understanding the geology and heterogeniety due to geology so that better knowledge about recharge and discharge can be known.

Mr. Siddaramiaih, KSPCB: Sharing his thoughts on self regulation and managing one’s water he mentioned- Communities like Rainbow drive managing their own water and closing the loop puts less burden on the agencies. Also, a proper cost benefit analysis to elaborate on the strategies of rainbow drive would be useful. Furthermore, he cautioned that recharge of groundwater through treated water should only be done when proper care for removal of nitrates and phosphates is taken.

Rohit Chakravarthy, NCBS: Drawing on his experience of participatory experiences in different sectors like e-bird portal and season watch for documenting birds and monitoring trees, Rohit explained the outreach mechanisms. Season watch and e-bird are two initiatives which call for citizen participation and tapping onto already existing citizen science. He cautioned that the scale and data quality issues are very critical and hence need to be considered.


Dr. Lingaraju, Department of Mines and Geology: Drawing on his experience of working with department of Mines and geology as well as Kumudvathi river rejuvenation project; he elaborated on the necessity of understanding geology. He suggested that obtaining the thematic geomorphology map as well as drainage map is essential as it can help in identifying zones feasible for recharge.

We would like to thank all the participants for sharing their views during and also after the workshop through different channels of communications. We hope to continue this engagement with you all!