Chennai, 14 Oct (H.S.):

Chennai’s drinking water network is set for a major upgrade with Chief Minister C. Joseph Vijay laying the foundation stone on Wednesday for a Rs 3,108.55 crore pipeline project designed to improve supplies across the city.

The ceremony at Sholinganallur will launch the proposed ring main network, which will enable the Chennai Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board to divert water between distribution zones when individual sources face shortages.

Spanning 98 kilometres, the network of iron pipelines will connect nine drinking water sources, including the Poondi, Puzhal, Cholavaram and Chembarambakkam reservoirs and seawater desalination plants supplying Chennai.

The project aims to overcome a longstanding constraint in the city’s supply system, where water from each facility is distributed through dedicated pipelines serving designated neighbourhoods, with limited connections between these separate networks.

The water board currently supplies around 1,200 million litres of drinking water daily. However, the existing arrangement makes it difficult to transfer surplus water from one source to localities dependent on another facility experiencing reduced availability.

Consequently, shortages in a particular supply zone cannot always be addressed even when additional water is available elsewhere in the system.

The ring main will link the separate supply networks, allowing the board to redistribute water according to demand and availability. This will provide greater flexibility in responding to fluctuations in reservoir levels and supplies from other facilities.

The scheme was conceived by the previous DMK administration at the same estimated cost to address gaps in Greater Chennai’s drinking water infrastructure.

Wednesday’s foundation stone ceremony marks its progression under the present government, with the focus on integrating existing sources into a coordinated distribution network.

Once completed, the interconnected pipelines are expected to help the water board manage local shortages more effectively and maintain steadier drinking water supplies across Chennai’s various distribution zones.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Arun Lakshman