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Sri Lanka: One Island Two Nations
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Wednesday, February 26, 2020
New methods of urban water banking
Vishvajith Peiris -Chartered Town Planner University of Moratuwa-Wednesday, February 26, 2020
Urbanization is a common phenomenon in the world where population is
increasingly attracted to cities with urban infrastructure and services.
Increased water abstraction and consumption in past decades has been a
result of increased population in the world. In present context, water
scarcity is considered as a critical issue in planning which has been a
result of urbanization and climate change.
In this context, urban population face a significant reduction of water resources in terms of drinking purposes as well as agriculture purposes. Presently, cities have initiated various strategies to tackle the water scarcity problem in urban areas both in terms of improving the supply level and demand management. But most cities predominantly adapt technical solutions through water supply improvement strategies (reservoir capacity improvement, ground water exploration, treated water reuse) rather than demand management in water use. But water is a finite resource which cannot be extended to co-op up with the increasing demand from population growth. Therefore, it is identified that supply level strategies let alone would not sufficient to address water scarcity problem in urban areas as a traditional approach. Different countries and regions with scarce water resources in the world have taken different steps to tackle urban water management issues and ensure sustainable use of limited water resources.
Arizona’s Water Plan
We all know Arizona is a desert environment. Then how people can thrive in those arid environments without abundance of the fundamental need for survival, water? Even I have experienced in Sri Lanka, people are not willing to live in arid or semi-arid regions mainly due to climatic conditions and lack of water resources. Even today, towns in down south such as Hambantota and far north such as Jaffna is facing severe water issues together with so-called climatic conditions that are not suitable for habitation in Sri Lanka. And some urban planners have found excuses to justify the agglomeration of population to Western Province due to the mild climate where exterior regions would face “uncontrollable” extreme heat and temperature especially in dry areas.
This “uncontrollable” factors have been converted into well-controlled and futuristic cities by using miraculous planning and engineering solutions in dry regions such as Arizona and California. States like California and Arizona are competing with other regions/ states in USA without grieving on the lack of resources, so countries like Sri Lanka has so many lessons to learn in managing the limited resources. Actually it was well managed in the past during kingdoms in dry zone in Sri Lanka, but I believe modern approaches linked with technical and financial solutions will be forefront in managing such issues in Sri Lanka.
Arizona is located in Western USA with prevailing arid conditions and one of their biggest problems was sustainable water supply for settlement development. The key asset available was Colarado river that flows throughout the state. In the early 20th century, Arizona governments took initial steps to manage water from Colarado river basin and the result was the establishment of Central Arizona Project (CAP).
CAP is a 336-mile (Approximately 540km) longman made canal stretches from Lake Havasu to Tucson which covers the water need of 80% of the state population. The project started in 1973 and took 20 years to complete.
The water is initially pumped to 826 feet (Approximately 251m) elevation and then flows through gravity and total construction cost was about USD 4 billion. The project considered an engineering marvel.
The important feature of CAP is not only its engineering aspects, but the management of water for different purposes. Since the water from Colarado river is static, the management of the water is crucial to deliver the water needs of future population. With increasing drought conditions and demands of development, water use has been projected for identifying future needs and alternative sources. One of the important initiatives taken by CAP is to store water in underground reservoirs. This is one of the futuristic goals of CAP and currently about 6% of water stored underground for future use. Meantime, the other options to source water such as desalination, waste water treatment and reuse are considered to meet future demands. Other important fact is the water import and export from other states to fulfill the water requirements.
One of the key features of Arizona water use is that the concept of water banking. According to research conducted in the field of water banking, it can be defined as a concept where water can be stored for future use or transfer to a different user in exchange of a fee. This is mainly applied for water scarce regions to secure water availability for agriculture and potable use. So Arizona has identified the importance of water as a scarce resource and stored water is used as a deposit in a bank as an investment for future use. Also CAP has to recover the cost of investment for long canal network, so cost structure and revenue sources are kept intact for the efficient use of water resources. Therefore, CAP ensures that sustainable water management in a desert region without pressurizing the government or general public on its use.
Water problems in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka is an island nation blessed with natural resources and water takes a special place in the livelihood. Island has 103 rivers which cover about 90% of the land with rich ground water sources and monsoonal rains in two seasons per year. According to ADB, Sri Lanka is identified as a country with no shortage of water due to the availability of water resources and precipitation. But the spatial and temporal variations of water availability have been created water scarcity issues in most parts of the island, especially in the dry and arid regions. Increasing urbanization and climate change induced disasters have significantly contributed to water stress in urban areas in recent past. One of the key challenges faced today by planners is to manage water scarcity issues in development of cities. Traditional planning approaches view development as tap into potentials for future development while today, it has been about managing the urbanization related challenges. In this context water scarcity has been a prime concern in planning of cities in Sri Lanka.
Traditionally, water security improvement projects are technical in nature ranging from new water supply projects to expansion of reservoir capacities. In the view of urbanization, these approaches are not sustainable to capture water demand resulted by increasing population. So it is mandatory to develop sustainable water demand management strategies to tackle water scarcity issues in urban context. Even though we have more fresh water than usage, the river water that runs through the island could be effectively used for water scarce regions. Socio political reasons play an important role in division of water rights, but it is a possibility since water distribution rights within the country is a sole responsibility of government.
National Water Supply & Drainage Board (NWSDB), the apex agency responsible for water supply in Sri Lanka has taken different measures to ensure the potable water supply for people in the country. Even though, there are number of diversion projects developed with other line ministries to ensure the water distribution for arid regions, water scarcity is a major issue in arid parts of the country such as Hambantota and Jaffna. For the conservation and management of demand, NWSDB has undertaken awareness programmes and promotion of techniques such as rain water harvesting within the communities in Sri Lanka. Demand management measures such as water pricing in peak demand, water restrictions and rebate schemes are not practically implemented in Sri Lanka which can be sensitive to economic and political decision making. On the other hand, water supply schemes are heavily subsidized by Sri Lankan government and considered a burden to the economy due to the cost of production and distribution.
Due to non-availability of independent regulatory agency for water supply and sanitation sector, drinking water provision may pose inefficient operations and poor investment decisions too.
This shows that technical solutions for new water supply projects may not only feasible, but also complicated due to both financial and socio cultural constraints involved in these areas. There are two reasons that urban planning involvement is necessary for solving the water issues in the urban scale.
r Water as a primary need for livelihood of the people, urban development plans have to ensure sustainable water supply for future population and activities to thrive in a specific urban area.
r Transferring water from one area to another involves many socio-cultural, political and spatial complications which might not be able to address through engineering solutions for water supply improvement.
Therefore, I believe Sri Lanka needs an innovative and timely solution to manage water in urban areas which has been a reason for regional disparity in the urban context. Since government has the authority over water supply, economic tools could also be helpful to avoid the financial losses faced by NWSDB in water supply in the country. In this view, it is argued that water banking could be one strategy to tackle the future water demand by creating win-win situation for both the government and population perspectives.
What can we learn from CAP?
CAP experience in Arizona proved that water scarcity may not be solved, but it can be managed. There are different tools and technologies available in the world today to estimate the existing water quantities and to look for alternative management mechanisms for efficient water use. Water storage for future use is not rocket science, but it needs careful planning and governance mechanism to reap the benefits for every citizen in the country.
In Sri Lanka, we have abundance water resources that flows into the ocean or polluted by various human activities. If the quantity of water can be stored or redistributed to water scarce regions, urbanization structure can be easily determined too. But making this happen is the real challenge. With the mentality and uncertainty in people minds, objection for water diversion projects are natural phenomena. People do not trust the government due to various incidents happened in the past. That may be true, but if we can give benefits for the people for transferring the water to some other region, this may be a possibility. Irrigation Department face difficulties in implementing water diversion from Matara to Hambantota (through Gin-Nilwala Diversion Project) and Kilinochchi to Jaffna (through Iranamadu Tank Diversion Project) mainly due to protests of farmers and general public. This may be a result of transparency and other political motives.
But what if the affected people receive financial gains through the diversion project with an insurance scheme to recover any damages caused by the project or similar financial gains to improve their agricultural fields as a compensation? Water banking could address these issues if water rights and its benefits are properly assessed in financial terms. From urban planning perspective, this could revolutionize the way people look at scarce resources and maintain equal distribution of resources to balance the growth and development in spatial context.
Also the impact of climate change induced disasters pose significant challenges on water security in cities, spatial planning interventions are necessary to understand and implement sustainable urban water management strategies. Instead of providing traditional approaches in water supply and demand management, provision of commercial values for water could facilitate the consumers to be responsible in water use, reduce the risk of water scarcity during drought periods and improve the public participation in decision making of water management.
It is high time to utilize different spatial planning tools to integrate water banking concept in managing urban water security of urban environments in Sri Lanka. Also the mechanisms that can be adopted to suit the local conditions of developing countries like Sri Lanka in implementation of such schemes would be a step towards adaptation to climate change impacts and achieving sustainable development goals.
In this context, urban population face a significant reduction of water resources in terms of drinking purposes as well as agriculture purposes. Presently, cities have initiated various strategies to tackle the water scarcity problem in urban areas both in terms of improving the supply level and demand management. But most cities predominantly adapt technical solutions through water supply improvement strategies (reservoir capacity improvement, ground water exploration, treated water reuse) rather than demand management in water use. But water is a finite resource which cannot be extended to co-op up with the increasing demand from population growth. Therefore, it is identified that supply level strategies let alone would not sufficient to address water scarcity problem in urban areas as a traditional approach. Different countries and regions with scarce water resources in the world have taken different steps to tackle urban water management issues and ensure sustainable use of limited water resources.
Arizona’s Water Plan
We all know Arizona is a desert environment. Then how people can thrive in those arid environments without abundance of the fundamental need for survival, water? Even I have experienced in Sri Lanka, people are not willing to live in arid or semi-arid regions mainly due to climatic conditions and lack of water resources. Even today, towns in down south such as Hambantota and far north such as Jaffna is facing severe water issues together with so-called climatic conditions that are not suitable for habitation in Sri Lanka. And some urban planners have found excuses to justify the agglomeration of population to Western Province due to the mild climate where exterior regions would face “uncontrollable” extreme heat and temperature especially in dry areas.
This “uncontrollable” factors have been converted into well-controlled and futuristic cities by using miraculous planning and engineering solutions in dry regions such as Arizona and California. States like California and Arizona are competing with other regions/ states in USA without grieving on the lack of resources, so countries like Sri Lanka has so many lessons to learn in managing the limited resources. Actually it was well managed in the past during kingdoms in dry zone in Sri Lanka, but I believe modern approaches linked with technical and financial solutions will be forefront in managing such issues in Sri Lanka.
Arizona is located in Western USA with prevailing arid conditions and one of their biggest problems was sustainable water supply for settlement development. The key asset available was Colarado river that flows throughout the state. In the early 20th century, Arizona governments took initial steps to manage water from Colarado river basin and the result was the establishment of Central Arizona Project (CAP).
CAP is a 336-mile (Approximately 540km) longman made canal stretches from Lake Havasu to Tucson which covers the water need of 80% of the state population. The project started in 1973 and took 20 years to complete.
The water is initially pumped to 826 feet (Approximately 251m) elevation and then flows through gravity and total construction cost was about USD 4 billion. The project considered an engineering marvel.
The important feature of CAP is not only its engineering aspects, but the management of water for different purposes. Since the water from Colarado river is static, the management of the water is crucial to deliver the water needs of future population. With increasing drought conditions and demands of development, water use has been projected for identifying future needs and alternative sources. One of the important initiatives taken by CAP is to store water in underground reservoirs. This is one of the futuristic goals of CAP and currently about 6% of water stored underground for future use. Meantime, the other options to source water such as desalination, waste water treatment and reuse are considered to meet future demands. Other important fact is the water import and export from other states to fulfill the water requirements.
One of the key features of Arizona water use is that the concept of water banking. According to research conducted in the field of water banking, it can be defined as a concept where water can be stored for future use or transfer to a different user in exchange of a fee. This is mainly applied for water scarce regions to secure water availability for agriculture and potable use. So Arizona has identified the importance of water as a scarce resource and stored water is used as a deposit in a bank as an investment for future use. Also CAP has to recover the cost of investment for long canal network, so cost structure and revenue sources are kept intact for the efficient use of water resources. Therefore, CAP ensures that sustainable water management in a desert region without pressurizing the government or general public on its use.
Water problems in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka is an island nation blessed with natural resources and water takes a special place in the livelihood. Island has 103 rivers which cover about 90% of the land with rich ground water sources and monsoonal rains in two seasons per year. According to ADB, Sri Lanka is identified as a country with no shortage of water due to the availability of water resources and precipitation. But the spatial and temporal variations of water availability have been created water scarcity issues in most parts of the island, especially in the dry and arid regions. Increasing urbanization and climate change induced disasters have significantly contributed to water stress in urban areas in recent past. One of the key challenges faced today by planners is to manage water scarcity issues in development of cities. Traditional planning approaches view development as tap into potentials for future development while today, it has been about managing the urbanization related challenges. In this context water scarcity has been a prime concern in planning of cities in Sri Lanka.
Traditionally, water security improvement projects are technical in nature ranging from new water supply projects to expansion of reservoir capacities. In the view of urbanization, these approaches are not sustainable to capture water demand resulted by increasing population. So it is mandatory to develop sustainable water demand management strategies to tackle water scarcity issues in urban context. Even though we have more fresh water than usage, the river water that runs through the island could be effectively used for water scarce regions. Socio political reasons play an important role in division of water rights, but it is a possibility since water distribution rights within the country is a sole responsibility of government.
National Water Supply & Drainage Board (NWSDB), the apex agency responsible for water supply in Sri Lanka has taken different measures to ensure the potable water supply for people in the country. Even though, there are number of diversion projects developed with other line ministries to ensure the water distribution for arid regions, water scarcity is a major issue in arid parts of the country such as Hambantota and Jaffna. For the conservation and management of demand, NWSDB has undertaken awareness programmes and promotion of techniques such as rain water harvesting within the communities in Sri Lanka. Demand management measures such as water pricing in peak demand, water restrictions and rebate schemes are not practically implemented in Sri Lanka which can be sensitive to economic and political decision making. On the other hand, water supply schemes are heavily subsidized by Sri Lankan government and considered a burden to the economy due to the cost of production and distribution.
Due to non-availability of independent regulatory agency for water supply and sanitation sector, drinking water provision may pose inefficient operations and poor investment decisions too.
This shows that technical solutions for new water supply projects may not only feasible, but also complicated due to both financial and socio cultural constraints involved in these areas. There are two reasons that urban planning involvement is necessary for solving the water issues in the urban scale.
r Water as a primary need for livelihood of the people, urban development plans have to ensure sustainable water supply for future population and activities to thrive in a specific urban area.
r Transferring water from one area to another involves many socio-cultural, political and spatial complications which might not be able to address through engineering solutions for water supply improvement.
Therefore, I believe Sri Lanka needs an innovative and timely solution to manage water in urban areas which has been a reason for regional disparity in the urban context. Since government has the authority over water supply, economic tools could also be helpful to avoid the financial losses faced by NWSDB in water supply in the country. In this view, it is argued that water banking could be one strategy to tackle the future water demand by creating win-win situation for both the government and population perspectives.
What can we learn from CAP?
CAP experience in Arizona proved that water scarcity may not be solved, but it can be managed. There are different tools and technologies available in the world today to estimate the existing water quantities and to look for alternative management mechanisms for efficient water use. Water storage for future use is not rocket science, but it needs careful planning and governance mechanism to reap the benefits for every citizen in the country.
In Sri Lanka, we have abundance water resources that flows into the ocean or polluted by various human activities. If the quantity of water can be stored or redistributed to water scarce regions, urbanization structure can be easily determined too. But making this happen is the real challenge. With the mentality and uncertainty in people minds, objection for water diversion projects are natural phenomena. People do not trust the government due to various incidents happened in the past. That may be true, but if we can give benefits for the people for transferring the water to some other region, this may be a possibility. Irrigation Department face difficulties in implementing water diversion from Matara to Hambantota (through Gin-Nilwala Diversion Project) and Kilinochchi to Jaffna (through Iranamadu Tank Diversion Project) mainly due to protests of farmers and general public. This may be a result of transparency and other political motives.
But what if the affected people receive financial gains through the diversion project with an insurance scheme to recover any damages caused by the project or similar financial gains to improve their agricultural fields as a compensation? Water banking could address these issues if water rights and its benefits are properly assessed in financial terms. From urban planning perspective, this could revolutionize the way people look at scarce resources and maintain equal distribution of resources to balance the growth and development in spatial context.
Also the impact of climate change induced disasters pose significant challenges on water security in cities, spatial planning interventions are necessary to understand and implement sustainable urban water management strategies. Instead of providing traditional approaches in water supply and demand management, provision of commercial values for water could facilitate the consumers to be responsible in water use, reduce the risk of water scarcity during drought periods and improve the public participation in decision making of water management.
It is high time to utilize different spatial planning tools to integrate water banking concept in managing urban water security of urban environments in Sri Lanka. Also the mechanisms that can be adopted to suit the local conditions of developing countries like Sri Lanka in implementation of such schemes would be a step towards adaptation to climate change impacts and achieving sustainable development goals.
