ASSESSMENT OF GROUND WATER IN COASTAL SAND DUNES IN PARTS OF PURl DISTRICT, ODISHA

Abstract

Excess withdrawal from coastal aquifer results in sea water upconing in coastal areas. In coastal regions mainly seawater is often present below fresh water . Due to this reason excessive withdrawal of fresh water can lead to withdrawal of saline water also. As a consequence seawater intrusion has been intensively studied for several decades. Many cities in India specially Mumbai, Kolkata, Pun, Chenni are dependent on supply of ground water through tube wells and shallow wells through which ground water is pumped and supplied to the areas. Due to excess pumping sea water upconing has been observed. On the above in view an attempt has been to estimate ground water in sand dune areas in Puri districts Odisha. Sand dunes are one of the major sources of fresh water reserve especially in Puri district Odisha. This districts is very densely populated and increase in pumping of ground water is observed to meet the demand of local population. Also for other developmental activities like tourism, industrialization etc, there is growing demand for fresh water. The demand of fresh water is expected to increase many fold in future as well. In order to meet the future water supply demand, more withdrawal of the ground water is expected. Hence, saline water ingress and salinity in aquifers is a growing concern. In this study we find that in Purl districts Astarang block is largely affected by sea water intrusion. Though, sea water intrusion did not observed in other blocks of study area, but still there is a big concern as trend of post monsoon water table is falling. Even in Puri block and some areas of Braharngiri block water table has gone down below sea lavel. The whole sand dune area has been delineated from SOT toposheets and it is coming around 248.1 sq km. The estimated fresh ground water resource in this area is about 4641.129 ha-rn. As this is an on-going study, its final conclusions are yet to be made. However, so far very interesting results bout occurrence of fresh water in the sand dune areas of Puri districts has been achieved. Yet more remains to be done about the delineation of sea water encroachment in the study area.