Rains, Wells, People

Before I begin posting, I’d like to introduce myself.

My name is Arun, and I am a second year student from Ambedkar University Delhi, where I am doing my bachelor's degree in Social Sciences and Humanities. For the last two weeks I have been interning with Biome's water team, which studies Bengaluru's growing water problem and comes up with ecologically viable solutions at the household and community level. My task, as an aspiring social scientist, has been to visit some of the places in the city that have sustainable systems of water management - specifically, rainwater harvesting (RWH) and open wells -, interact with the owners, and provide estimates of how successful these setups are in the long run.

Since I study neither engineering nor architecture, my focus has not been so much on technical details. Instead, I've been looking at the issue as a sociological problem, with one basic question: can ecological awareness be built into the consciousness of a city as diverse as Bengaluru? In the past decade, rapid urbanization and commercialization in the metropolis have attracted a lot of attention from corporate entities, whose activities have completely changed the once-green garden city into an IT and business hub. The quiet, peaceful "pensioner's paradise" is dying, but can its values survive the onslaught of globalization? I don't have an answer yet, but after each site visit, I feel I've gained a new perspective on the situation.

In the upcoming posts, I will be narrating my experiences with the people I meet and the interesting things I see every time I go on field. I will try to do so in as much detail as possible, while at the same time bearing in mind the larger picture and the purpose of this research project. I hope that by engaging with and discussing the growing water movement, as well as by collecting data that can be used later, I am spreading some awareness about the severity of the issues and the desperate need to solve them.

- Arun Rams

Learning About Water In Bangalore

My first two weeks with Biome went by fast and it’s been great so far! I'm new to Bangalore so I  spent most of that time shadowing others on their site visits to get a feel for the city, what sort of projects people are doing, and what the general approach is. Surprisingly, but also not, each person had a different style of interacting with potential clients and looked at various aspects of water management. Their approach could be influenced by their own past experiences or knowledge of that community/client, as well as their area of expertise.

Some of the visits I went on in those first two weeks were:

• Monday (Jun 5): I met Shubha at Harman’s Ecospace office for a World Earth Day presentation on water management in the afternoon. We sat for a while to discuss our expectations of my time with Biome and the plan for the next two weeks. I then listened to her presentation and learned more about Biome, what they do, and Bangalore’s water issues. There were approximately 40 employees that came to listen to her speak, including a few young men from Bangalore listening. I was impressed with their knowledge of their water sources and insightful questions and comments.  I know many people who don’t know where their water actually comes from or how it gets treated before leaving the tap at home, so it was refreshing to see people who were aware of these things.

• Tuesday (Jun 6): Most of my day was spent with Aditi and Kiran visiting three government schools which are interested in rainwater harvesting. All three of the schools had already had a small RWH system installed previously by the government but were used infrequently, if at all, since most of them were not working properly. Part of this seemed to be because the system was created without getting much input from the school workers, so the location or other parts were not appropriate for the situation. During all three visits, we interviewed an administrator and/or teacher to gain an understanding of their problems regarding water – primarily if quality or quantity was the issue. We also toured the sites to see the layout and existing infrastructure. Those notes and pictures from each of the campuses will be used to help decide if CSR funds will be used to move forward with those projects. At one of the schools, all of the children were on a recess of sorts and I was a popular attraction for the girls that were running around. No matter what I wear, it’s hard not to stick out when I have light skin, light hair, and blue eyes.
• Thursday (Jun 8): I spent a few hours with Chandika visiting the Sewage Treatment Plants at Dorekere and Uttarahalli Lakes. The original intent was to sample the influent and effluent at both STPs but both lakes (and thus STPs) were technically closed to the public when we arrived and required a permission document. We were able to briefly tour the indoor part of the Dorekere STP and Chandika got a few pictures of that setup. When we got to Uttarahalli Lake, we were allowed to walk to the STP but it was fenced off and without any employees there we couldn’t see much of it. According to a few articles I read later, Uttarahalli Lake was revitalized around 2013 as it had previously been a wasteland instead of a community asset. Prior to the rejuvenation, the BBMP did a lake score study which rates the lake on various parameters such as having an STP, fences, security guards, walkability, etc. This sort of assessment reminds me of some of the ones at home and I can definitely see the benefit of using it as a way to understand the quality of lakes from a human needs perspective while also prioritizing which ones to work on improving next. It’d be cool to see this further developed to account for the quality of the lake from more of an environmental and ecosystems perspective.

• Friday (Jun 9): Himanshu and I traveled to Lakeshore Homes to discuss water management options for their community. The community has been visited before but it seems like not much had come out of those previous meetings. Their water situation has become a bit more serious lately so they may be more inclined to move forward this time. They are already doing a small amount of recharge and rainwater harvesting, though that water goes directly into the stormwater drains instead of being used in the home first. There were also a few homes that had previously had troubles with flooding in their basements which was mitigated by digging open wells in the yard. This not only eliminated the flooding but also provided water for the residents of that home to use before using piped water from the community. It was mainly recommended that individual homes practice RWH for consumption, additional recharge wells, and that other success stories from within and other communities be shared to promote holistic water management practices. 

• Saturday (Jun 10): I met Avinash at Chaithanya Samarpan, an upper-class gated community that has slowly begun to experience more water scarcity over the last few years due to wells running dry and more residents coming in. While there, we discussed their current infrastructure (which includes a water treatment facility, borewells, and several recharge wells). It appeared as though there was no rainwater harvesting being collected directly from rooftops for recharge or consumption, though runoff that was captured was used for recharge. We toured parts of the community where the wells are located to get a sense of their condition as well as any monitoring or testing that should be done for a comprehensive understanding of their water. While the group needs to decide their preferred course of action before asking Biome for further assistance, we did discuss RWH on the clubhouse as an example before moving towards individual homes. 

 

• Monday (Jun 12): Chandika and I visited a private home to test the efficiency of their grey water treatment system. The system itself was very aesthetically pleasing which fit in with the home. At the time of our visit, the treated water in the storage tank was quite clean. Unfortunately, we learned this was because something was wrong with the piping so there was no water coming into the system, and thus no water leaving the system. Since no water was leaving the system, all of solids in the treated water had been able to settle out which won’t usually be the case when they use it. I’m not sure if the problem is related, but Chandika also noted that there were mosquito larvae in each of the treatment tanks which signaled an issue – to me, this makes sense because the water would have been stagnant for a while since there was no influent. 
  
• Wednesday (Jun 14): Vishwanath and I went to Senapathy Whiteley outside of Ramanagaram, which is south of Bangalore towards Mysore. This place was really interesting to visit – we walked through a few adjacent factory properties, each of which does a different process. A lot of the water is provided by borewells owned by two farmers on either side of the properties, as most of their own borewells are dry and the 2 that remain cannot provide the entire demand. There were a few small treatment plants to handle the industrial wastewater as well as two RO systems to treat water for use in their processes. They make a specialized paper product which requires high quality water, so having the RO filters was extremely important for them. Interestingly, Vishwanath pointed out that one of the borewells was struggling to provide water which he noticed because the flow from the supply pipe was pulsing – he suggested a smaller pump could help to get rid of this issue. There is also a neighboring slaughterhouse which has unfortunately contaminated one of the nearby waters. There was a lot of emphasis placed on groundwater recharge as part of the solution because the roof area is large enough to capture a significant amount of rainwater that could be directed into new wells. Before we left, we had a clear list of action items for the clients as they move forward.
  
  
• Thursday (Jun 15): I met Shreyas, who will be my partner for the duration of my stay here in Bangalore. We visited Manipal County which is both a resort and an academic campus on 11 acres and is looking for assistance with their water management. During the meeting, we discussed their current water sources, costs, and the overall layout of the campus before going on a tour of the property – we were also provided with a master plan of the entire property and a hard copy of the plan set for the academic portion of the campus. During the tour, we looked at the storm drains, the working MBR STP, one of the RO systems, the piping, and an open well that stores water for things like watering the lawn.
  
   - Alana
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

Pump test at Cubbon Park

 

On 21^st May, 2017 while the TCS World 10k was ongoing, a group of 11 workers from Peddanna’s Rain water harvesting were enthusiastically carrying out their work of cleaning the well. TCS world 10k during its 10^th edition had announced ‘give back’ to the city which gave rise to The Cubbon Park Rejuvenation project. The scientific support is given by Biome Trust, a leading water conservation and eco-architectural firm.

A total well cleaning is an excellent opportunity to carry out pumping test. A pump test a.k.a Aquifer test has two parts which includes the flow test and aquifer recharge test. In the flow test, the amount of water drawn out is monitored along with fall in water level in the well at certain interval. Well Peddanna used a 3 horse power motor pump to pump out water and it took approximately 6 hours to drain out the well 12 feet diameter and 25 feet of water, the total depth of well is 40 feet.

Aquifer recharge test is done by draining out all the water from the well and checking the amount of water rise after 24 hours. Another way of doing this would be continuous monitoring at fixed interval until the initial water level is achieved after a complete drawdown. These being manual methods, there are more technically advanced methods incorporating sensors that would help in continuous monitoring and reporting without one being physically present at the site.

Cubbon park has 7 open well, depending on the dimensions, each holds more or less 60,000 liter of water. Water from the well will be used for watering the rose garden around the state central library.  So back to pump test, which was done from 20^th to 22^nd May, 2017. The total time taken to pump it the water was 6 hours when the water level around 18 feet with average of 3 feet per hour of drawdown. The recharge of the well was checked after 24 hours. The water recovered to 8 feet in 24 hours i.e 25,620 litre.
The significance of aquifer recharge test is to estimate the amount of water that can be drawn per day. Below are the observation as recorded during the study:
 Initial water depth : 18 ft Initial volume : 57,645.9 litre

Time Interval (From-To)	Drop in level (ft)	Volume Extracted (litre)
1 hour (8-9a.m)	4.3	13,771.1
1.5 hours (9-10:30am)	4.1	13,130.5
1 hour (10:30-11:30am)	3.5	11,208.9
1 hour (11:30 am- 12:30pm)	3.2	10,248.1
1.5 hours (12:30-2:00pm)	2.9	9,287.3

Water level after desilting and removing debries : 0.54ft

Volume of water after complete draw down : 1500 l (approximate as the surface was not even)
A major interference in aquifer recharge test is that the water that was drawn out during the clean up was let out in the close proximity. A further study is necessary in different season to estimate the recharge capacity acurately throughout the year. This study would be essential to determine and plan the amount of water that can be withdrawn during each season.