PLANNING FOR DEVELOPMENT OF WATER RESOURCES OF MANER RIVER BASIN

Abstract

Water, the most precious gift of the nature, is the prime natural resource and source of life. Development of nation depends upon the effective, efficient and appropriate uses of its water resources. Water, as a resource, is under relentless pressure due to population explosion with rise in living standard, rapid urbanization, large-scale industrialization and environmental demands. Therefore, it is necessary to develop, conserve, utilize and economically manage this critically important resource on an integrated basis so as to meet the ever- growing demand. Water resources planning and development is broadly concerned with the accurate assessment, identification and management of water from different sources for the welfare of the human being. In this work entitled "Planning for development of water resources of •Maner River basin", an attempt has been made to assess the surface water potential of the Maner basin and to determine the optimal annual yields by simultaneously optimizing the cropping pattern for each major and medium projects at the same time, satisfying the project specific demands to the maximum possible extent during a successful year. The virgin flow series at the GD site of the Maner basin have been generated using water balance equation to assess the annual gross water surface yield of the basin. Observed flows at GD site, upstream water utilization and its regeneration, evaporation losses from the reservoirs, storage effects, import and export of water have been considered in the water balance equation. The total water demand includes the irrigation water demand, domestic water demand and environmental demand. The irrigation water demand has been estimated using standard FAO method and the domestic water demand has been estimated considering iii the projected population and per capita water demand as per Indian practice. The environmental and ecological demand has been assessed as per the norms adopted by NWDA. The annual gross surface water yield of the Maner basin is estimated to be 810.432 MCM at 76 percent annual dependability. If considered the annual water import from the adjacent sub basin, the annual surface water potential of the basin is estimated to be 2502.432 MCM against annual water utilization of 4363.36 MCM for the planning horizon 2050 A.D. Hence, The Maner basin is deemed to be water deficit basin. System analysis techniques are widely used in the field of water resources planning and management. Linear Programming (LP) based models can handle a very large number of decision variables and constraints which are generally encountered during the studies on river basins. The integrated reservoir yield model, an implicit stochastic LP based model, is applied to assess the optimal annual multi-yields with specific reliabilities and to determine the optimal cropping plan of the projects of the Maner basin. The result of yield model reveals that out of the total six reservoirs, only two reservoirs are meeting the target water demands satisfying the proposed cropping plan. The rest of the reservoirs are experiencing shortfall of water ranging from 2.24 percent to 68.25 percent. Out of the four reservoirs experiencing water shortfall, the two reservoirs with comparatively less water shortfall can meet the target with slight modification in the proposed cropping plan. But, for the other two reservoirs, their designed command areas need to be revisited or alternative source of water, i.e., ground water as well as import of water from other basins can be considered to meet the targets