Surface water resources

There are four major sources of surface water. These are rivers, lakes, ponds, and tanks. In the country,
there are about 10,360 rivers and their tributaries longer than 1.6 km each. The mean annual flow in all
the river basins in India is estimated to be 1,869 cubic km.

However, due to topographical, hydrological and other constraints, only about 690 cubic km (32 per
cent) of the available surface water can be utilised. Water flow in a river depends on size of its
catchment area or river basin and rainfall within its catchment area.

There are three major types of surface water. Permanent (perennial) surface waters are present year
round, and includes lakes, rivers and wetlands (marshes and swamps). Semi-permanent (ephemeral)
surface water refers to bodies of water that are only present at certain times of the year including
seasonally dry channels such as creeks, lagoons and waterholes. Man-made surface water is water that
can be continued by infrastructures that humans have assembled. This would be dammed artificial
lakes, canals and artificial ponds (e.g. garden ponds) or swamps.

The surface water held by dams can be used for renewable energy in the form of hydropower.
Hydropower is the forcing of surface water sourced from rivers and streams to produce energy

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Ground water resource

Groundwater is the largest source of freshwater for mankind. Isotope techniques are used to determine
the origin and replenishment rates of groundwater, obtained through the use of stable and
radioisotopes naturally present in groundwater. Groundwater constitutes 30 per cent of the world's
available freshwater.

The total replenishable groundwater resources in the country are about 432 cubic km. Table 6. 1 shows
that the Ganga and the Brahamaputra basins, have about 46 per cent of the total replenishable
groundwater resource s. The leve1 of groundwater utilisation is relatively high in the river basins lying in
north-western region and parts of south India.

The groundwater utilisation is very high in the states of Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, and Tamil Nadu.
However, there are States like Chhattisgarh, Odisha. Kerala, etc., which utilise only a small proportion of
their groundwater potentials. States like Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Tripura and Maharashtra are
utilising their ground water resources at a moderate rate.

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Frozen water resources
Frozen water includes glaciers water ,ice caps.glacier ice is the largest source of fresh water on
earth ,holding with ice sheets about 69% of the fresh water

It is old water ,sometime formed more than 1700 year ago . typically it has an extremely low mineral
content and is similar in taste and other qualities to rainwater, in warmer summer tempreature glariers
mealt and create water source which are important for human use.

Frozen water is found on the Earth's surface primarily as snow cover, freshwater ice in lakes and rivers,
sea ice, glaciers, ice sheets, and frozen ground and permafrost (permanently frozen ground).

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Rain water harvesing

Rainwater harvesting (RWH) is the collection and storage of rain, rather than allowing it to run off.
Rainwater is collected from a roof-like surface and redirected to a tank, cistern, deep pit (well, shaft, or
borehole), aquifer, or a reservoir with percolation, so that it seeps down and restores the ground water.
Dew and fog can also be collected with nets or other tools. Rainwater harvesting differs from
stormwater harvesting as the runoff is collected from roofs, rather than creeks, drains, roads, or any
other land surfaces. 10  Its uses include watering gardens, livestock, irrigation, domestic use with proper
treatment, and domestic heating. The harvested water can also be committed to longer-term storage or
groundwater recharge.

Rainwater harvesting is one of the simplest and oldest methods of self-supply of water for households,
and residential and household-scale projects, usually financed by the user. However, larger systems for
schools, hospitals, and other facilities can run up costs only able to be financed by owners,
organizations, and governmental units.

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Desalination

Desalination is a process that takes away mineral components from saline water. More generally,
desalination refers to the removal of salts and minerals from a target substance,as in soil desalination,
which is an issue for agriculture. Saltwater (especially sea water) is desalinated to produce water
suitable for human consumption or irrigation. The by-product of the desalination process is
brine.Desalination is used on many seagoing ships and submarines. Most of the modern interest in
desalination is focused on cost-effective provision of fresh water for human use. Along with recycled
wastewater, it is one of the few rainfall-independent water resources.

Due to its energy consumption, desalinating sea water is generally more costly than fresh water from
surface water or groundwater, water recycling and water conservation. However, these alternatives are
not always available and depletion of reserves is a critical problem worldwide. Desalination processes
are usually driven by either thermal (in the case of distillation) or mechanical (e.g. in the case of reverse
osmosis) energy types.

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Water usage in india

Irrigation by far is the largest user of India’s water reserve with hooping usage of 78% of total water
reserve, followed by domestic sector (6%) and industrial sector (5%)(PIB 2013).

National Commission on Integrated Water Resources Development (NCIWRD) the irrigation sector alone
is going to need additional 71 bcm by 2025 and 250 bcm of water by 2050 compared to the demands of
2010 (Press Information Bureau 2013).

Ground Water is also a major source of drinking water in urban and rural India. 45% of total irrigation
and 80% of domestic water come from ground water reserve.

States like DL, PN, HR, UP over exploitation of ground water has led to water scarcity. States like RJ, GJ
arid climate leads to water stressed condition, while in TN, KA, AP poor aquifer properties are
responsible for water scarcity. Other reasons being increasing population pressures, industrial growth
and unprecedented pace of urbanization.

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How safe is our water?

About 70% of surface water resources in India are polluted.

The major contributing factor for water pollution are wastewater from different sources, intensive
agriculture, industrial production, infrastructure development and untreated urban runoff .

Everyday 2.9 billion liters of waste water from industrial and domestic sources are dumped into the river
Ganga without treatment.

According to WHO, Half of India’s morbidity is water related.

Waste management has not been as efficient as required to manage increasing volume of waste
generated daily in India, especially in cities. Municipal wastewater treatment capacity developed so far
in India accounts for only 29% waste generated in urban habitations having population more than
50,000 and the gap is projected to increase.

Domestic effluents contribute a substantial proportion of water pollution in India. More than 70% of
domestic untreated effluents are disposed-off to environment.

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Report released by the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO)

54% of rural woman in India had to travel between 200 metres and 5 kilometres daily to fetch drinking
water in 2012.

They walked 20 minutes a day, on an average, and spend another 15 minutes at the source of water

Every second woman has to spend 210 hours in a year for fetching water which means a loss of 27 days’
wages for these households. Collectively, these women cover 64,000 times the distance between the
earth and the moon.

Water crisis is imminent in villages because of over harvesting of ground-water resources. About 80% of
the country’s drinking water needs are met by groundwater.

75% of the women in states like CJ, MN, OD, JH have to travel long distances for drinking water.

India records world’s highest per capita water-borne diseases even more than some of the least
developed nations.

In most of the large cities about one-third of water never reaches the consumer because of leaks and
poor maintenance. According to Centre for Science and Environment, over 35% of water in Delhi and
about 30% in Mumbai is lost because of leakage.

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