Groundwater pricing strategies for city of Kanpur

Abstract

Groundwater makes up the largest reservoir of freshwater in the world accounting for over 97% of the earth’s freshwater. With this pace of economic development and population growth, water demands are rapidly increasing, and water resources are becoming scarce in many regions of the world. In Indian scenario, groundwater is many a times preferred above surface water sources due to its universal availability, reliability which has resulted in indiscriminate extraction and the declining groundwater levels. India is the highest user of groundwater in the world, at 260 cubic km/annum. It is estimated that the country consumes 25 % of the total groundwater extracted globally, ahead of China and USA. Out of the total groundwater consumption 90 % is used for agriculture and only 10 % is utilized for urban domestic or industrial purposes. Urban residents increasingly rely on groundwater due to unreliable and inadequate municipal water supplies, approximately 50% of urban water requirements are fulfilled by groundwater. The upcoming decades will be the most rapid period of urban growth in human history, with 2.6 billion additional urban dwellers expected by 2050. In India, the ganga basin is observed to have maximum groundwater draft records since it has one of the world’s best aquifers having high storage capacity and highly replenishable with plenty rainfall. Hence, the study focuses on the management of urban groundwater extraction in city of Kanpur which is one of the largest cities in the ganga basin. As per CGWB the status of Kanpur block is over exploited block in terms of groundwater development. The highly uneven geomorphic setup, climatic, hydrologic and hydrogeological settings, ground water availability, water utilization pattern for various sectors and the socio-economic set-up of the region demands a solution which considers all the factors thus addressing the spatial variations existing in the study area. There is an utmost need for the development of Groundwater pricing strategies as a part of multidisciplinary groundwater governance which can curb the over exploitation of groundwater in urban areas. The study therefore aims at developing Groundwater pricing strategies as a tool for Groundwater management in the city of Kanpur. The study includes the assessment of existing Groundwater management in the study area for gap identification. A micro study area has been selected for conducting detailed primary survey and analysis. The analysis includes the Executive Summary iii Groundwater Pricing Strategies for city of Kanpur identification of groundwater consumption patterns and its direct relationship with the socio-economic profile of the user and the availability of municipal water supply infrastructure. The amount of potential groundwater recharge has also been estimated through natural infiltration as well as manmade recharge structures. The primary survey with the stakeholders and the concerned officials gives a glimpse of the prevailing issue related to groundwater depletion and the measures which could be undertaken. Based on the natural hydrogeological features, available water supply infrastructure and groundwater consumption patterns the level of groundwater criticality has been identified for the city at ward level, which can act as the basis for the dynamics of the groundwater pricing model and address the vulnerability of the available resource. The willingness to pay of the user has been identified through the hedonic regression model based on the external and internal factors related to groundwater. The variation in the consumption requires to be addressed through a targeted tariff system. Increased block tariff has been selected as a mechanism for conservation pricing. The amount of extractable water in each block addresses the equity amongst users and aims at curbing over extraction. The tariff for each block will also be the function of groundwater criticality in the area. Hence, the pricing model will be a 2-part tariff system including the first part as the variable increasing block tariff and the second part will be the fixed meter rent and connection charge. The resultant pricing model will thus include spatial variation in criticality of groundwater. Alongside it gives due regard to the high consumption levels in the form of additional marginal cost of groundwater resource which are being addressed in the form of high tariffs for the later blocks. The tool thus automatically identifies the high consumption beneficiaries of the service those who can be discouraged from the benefits of over exploitation of groundwater resource. The method also incentivizing the judicious usage of the resource thus ensuring the efficient abstraction of the groundwater resource in the study area among all the users. Apart from the model the strategies also include the registration of the borewells and mandatory recharge structure in order to maintain the groundwater level.