Introduction to

“Water resources management”

 Definition

“Water resource management is the activity of planning, developing,

distributing and managing the optimum use of water resources”
It is a sub-set of water cycle management.

Ideally, water resource management planning has regard to all the

competing demands for water and seeks to allocate water on an
equitable basis to satisfy all uses and demands. As with other resource
management, this is rarely possible in practice.
 Water Resources Management is the integrating
concept for a number of water sub-sectors such as
hydropower, water supply and sanitation, irrigation
and drainage, etc.
 An integrated water resources perspective ensures that
social, economic, environmental and technical
dimensions are taken into account in the management
and development of water resources.
 Between the water resources and water needs (demands)
often occur some tensions and conflicts.
 These problems may be spatial, areal and temporal,
endemic or general either.
 These problems drew attention to the importance of water
resource management. We have to define the concept of
water resources management.
 The water resources management is the sum of the
activities aimed the coordination of the naturally occurring
water resources and social water needs (demands). With
coordination we can create a well functioning balance
between water resources and water needs.
Water Resource Problems
 Too much water
 Too little water
 Poor-quality water
The water resources management includes:

The quantitative and qualitative exploration of water

resources

Water needs and inventory records

Measurement and matching of the water resources and

water needs (demands) in a special system
 Water on Earth
 About 97% Earth’s water is salty–less than 1% of
the planet’s water is available fresh H2O

 Fresh water is distributed unevenly

 2025: 1/3 human population will live in areas
lacking fresh water
It is looking blue,
but…
Hydrological Cycle
The chain of various process through which water from
one form has to pass in order to return back to the same
form is called hydrological cycle.

The sequence of conditions through which water passes

from vapor in the atmosphere through precipitation
upon land or water surfaces and ultimately back into the
atmosphere as a result of evaporation and transpiration
is known as hydrological cycle.
 The whole process
 The important phases of hydrological cycle are,
1. Evaporation
2. Transpiration
3. Condensation
4. Precipitation
5. Infiltration
6. Runoff
 Evaporation
 Water is transferred from the surface to the atmosphere through evaporation, the
process by which water changes from a liquid to a gas.
 Evaporation takes place as a result of heat energy provided by solar radiations.
 Water is evaporated from all the exposed things like oceans, rivers, lakes, ponds,
earth’s surface, plants etc.
 Approximately 80% of all evaporation is from the oceans, with the remaining 20%
coming from inland water and vegetation.
 Transpiration
 Transpiration is the process of water loss from plants.
 Transpiration takes place when the vapour pressure in the air less than
that in the leaf cells. It means transpiration is nil when the relative
humidity of the air is 100%.
 Condensation
 Condensation is the process by which water vapor changes in to
water.
 Water vapor condenses to form dew or fog. Condensation takes place
due to cooling of air
 As water rises higher in the atmosphere, it starts to cool and become
a liquid again. When a large amount of water vapor condenses, it
results in the formation of clouds.
 Precipitation
 When the water in the clouds gets too heavy, the water falls back to the
earth.
 Forms of precipitation –
Drizzle, sleet, rain, snow, hail
 A part of the precipitation may evaporate back into the atmosphere even
while falling
 some part may be intercepted by vegetation, structures and other such
surface modifications from which it is evaporated back.
 Another part joins the surface and subsurface sources of water.
 Infiltration
 Some rain water soaks into the ground and may reach goundwater and
is stored in layers of rocks below the surface of earth.
 This seeping of precipitation into the ground water is called
infiltration.
 This water stays there for varying amounts of time. Some amounts may
evaporate back within days, some amounts may stay for centuries.
 Runoff
 Most of the water which returns to land, flows downhill as runoff.
 Some of it flows on the earth’s surface, joins the rivers and streams,
and finally reaches the ocean.
 Some of it flows along with ground water under the ground after
penetration. It may stay under the ground or comes up through the
springs or any other outlets.
 The portion of precipitation which by a variety of paths above or
below the surface of the earth reaches the stream channel is called
runoff.
 Once it enters a stream channel, runoff becomes stream flow.
Oceans Glaciers, Ground Lakes,
97.5% Snow & water swamps &
permafrost 0.075% rivers
1.725% 0.025%

The world’s water

resources
Global water sources
 Glaciers/ Icecaps
 69% of the total fresh water
 10% of the world’s landmass is covered by these
 Most of the part is situated in Greenland and Antarctica
(Most Inaccessible & Uninhabited places)
 Not readily available for human use
 Ground water
 Second most abundantly available fresh water resource
 Constitutes 30% of the global fresh water resources
 More than 1.5 billion people are dependent upon GW.

 Freshwater lakes
 Natural fresh water accounts for 0.26%
 More than 50% of these lakes found in canada.

 Reservoirs
 Artificial lakes
 4300 cubic km.
 Used for irrigation, drinking, hydropower & industrial
purposes
 Wetlands
 Accounts for 0.04%
 Distributed as marshes, lagoons, swamps, bogs, mires etc.
 Play an important role in maintaining the freshwater
ecology, the recharge of GW.

 Rivers
 Most important part of fresh water resources
 0.006% of total fresh water resources
 Most of the part is readily available for use
Water resources of India
 India - 329 M-ha area
 12 Major river basins – 252.8 Mha
 48 medium river basins – 24.9 Mha
 4% of the total average annual runoff of the rivers of
world.

 Precipitation - 4000 cubic km.

 Total runoff 2333 cubic km (CWC)

(Source: Water resources of India, Current Science, Vol. 89, No. 5, 10 September
2005, by Rakesh Kumar, R. D. Singh and K. D. Sharma )
Per capita – Per annum
water availability

Per capita – Per annum

Sl. No. Years availability cubic m.
1 1951 6602
2 1971 4349
3 1981 2829
4 2000 2384
5 2025 1589
 Actual Utilisable water resource in India

SW GW Total

69.03 41.85 110.88

Source: Water resources of India, by Central water and power commision, 1988

x 10^5 ha-m
Ground water resources
 It is the water that has infiltrated into the earth directly
from precipitation and recharge from surface water
bodies.

 Infiltration directly from precipitation and recharge

from surface water like melting of snow and ice, river
basins, streams, lakes, reservoirs, canals and artificial
recharge by human activities are the usual main sources
that contribute to the GW of a region.
Advantages of Utilizing Ground Water for water supply
 It is made available within a few hundred meters of the
place where it is required for irrigation and where as
surface water requires long conveying channel system.
 It is made available for areas where surface water is
utilized for other uses.
 Yield from wells generally exhibit less fluctuations than
surface water in alternating wet and dry periods.
 Compared to surface water, it is relatively free from the
effect of surface pollutants because it results from deep
percolation of water infiltrated into the soil.
Ground water as a storage medium
Aquifers
Any geological formation that is water-bearing is
called as an aquifer.
Such formations readily transmit water to wells and
springs.

1. Unconfined aquifers
2. Confined aquifers
Unconfined Aquifers
 Where groundwater is in direct contact with the atmosphere through the
open pore spaces of the overlying earth, then the aquifer is said to be
unconfined.
 An aquifer where water table is the upper surface limit and extends below
till the impermeable rock strata is called the unconfined aquifer.
 The upper groundwater surface in an unconfined aquifer is called the water
table.
 The depth of water table from surface varies according to factors such as the
topography, geology, season and pumpage of wells.
 Unconfined aquifers are usually recharged by rain or stream water
infiltrating directly through the overlying soil.
Confined Aquifer
 When an aquifer is confined/sandwitched between
two impermeable layers, it is known as a confined
aquifer.

 It is also known as a pressure aquifer.

 Confined aquifers don’t have a water table

 Recharge of this aquifer only takes place in the area

where it is exposed at the ground surface.
Water scarcity
Water scarcity is either the lack of enough water, or lack
of access to safe water. Water scarcity involves water
crisis, water shortage, water deficit or water stress.
 According to WWF, some 1.1 billion people worldwide
lack access to water, and a total of 2.8 billion find water
scarce for at least one month of the year.
 By 2025, two-thirds of the world’s population may be
facing water shortages, according to the World
Wildlife Federation
 Water scarcity can be due to physical water scarcity
and economic water scarcity.
 Physical water scarcity refers to a situation where
natural water resources are unable to meet a region’s
demand.
 Economic water scarcity is a result of poor water
management resources.
Physical water scarcity
 Physical water scarcity occurs when there isn’t enough
water to meet demand.
 Roughly 20% of the world’s population now lives in
physical water scarcity.
 Another 500 million live in areas “approaching
physical scarcity.”
 This could be the result of dry or arid local conditions,
but distribution also plays a role.
Economic water scarcity
 Economic water scarcity is predominant throughout
Africa, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa.
 An estimated 1.6 billion people around the world live
in areas of economic water scarcity, with 780 million
people living in areas with no basic water services.
 Compounding the lack of infrastructure investment
are political and ethnic conflicts, which continue to
increase and intensify worldwide as water becomes
more and more scarce.
 Inadequate water supplies can also contribute to
political and economic instability.
Causes of water scarcity
 Overuse of Water
 Pollution of Water
 Conflict
 Distance
 Drought
 Governmental Access
Effects
 Lack of adequate drinking water
 Hunger
 Lack of Education
 Diseases
 Sanitation Issues
 Poverty
Solutions for Water Scarcity
 Education
 Recycle Water
 Advance Technology Related to Water Conservation
 Improve Practices Related to Farming
 Improve Sewage Systems
 Support Clean Water Initiatives
 Recharging aquifers/groundwater
 Desalination
 Water Management
 Infrastructure Repair and Maintenance
Water Balance
 The concept of water balance has recently gained
considerable importance among the climatologists,
Meteorologists, Geographers, Geologists, Hydrologists
and from other disciplines concerned primarily with
water problems.

 It is very useful to study water balance and to apply this

concept in the study of rational conservation of water
resources.
 Water balance may be defined as the income of water
from precipitation and other sources and the loss or
outflow of water by means of evapotranspiration

 The study of water balance necessitates the study of

hydrologic cycle since the balance is based mainly on
two elements, viz., Precipitation, the income or input
element and evapotranspiration the expenditure or
output element.
Wb Eqn
 Water balance equation can be used to describe the
flow of water in and out of a system.
 The water balance is a method by which we can
amount for the hydrologic cycle of a specific area.
 It is simply the statement of law of conservation of
mass in a closed system.

General water balance Eqn,

Mass inflow – Mass outflow = Change in mass storage

Vi – Vo = ∆ S
 Applying to hydrologic cycle,

P – R – G – E – T = ∆S

S = Ss + Ssm + Sg

∆S = ∆Ss + ∆Ssm + ∆Sg

 Interms of Rainfall & runoff relationship

R=P–L

L = Losses = Water not available for runoff due to soil

moisture, GW storage, evaporation, transpiration and
surface storage.

The water balance can be illustrated using a water

balance graph which plots levels of precipitation and
evapotranspiration often on a monthly scale.
Applications of Wb Eqn
 A water balance can be used to help manage water
supply and predict where there may be water
shortages.
 It is also used in irrigation, runoff assessment
and flood control
 Evaluate the components of the hydrologic cycle
 Snowmelt simulation
 Climate change impact assessment
 Flow forecasting and project design
 Assess agricultural water management
Characteristic features
The water balance method has four characteristic features.
 A water balance can be assessed for any subsystem of the
hydrologic cycle, for any size of area, and for any period of
time.
 A water balance can serve to check whether all flow and
storage components involved have been considered
quantitatively.
 A water balance can serve to calculate one unknown of the
balance equation, provided that the other components are
known with sufficient accuracy.
 A water balance can be regarded as a model of the complete
hydrologic process under study, which means it can be used to
predict what effect the changes imposed on certain
components will have on the other components of the system
or subsystem.
 Some important points…
 Without an accurate water balance, it is not possible to manage
water resources of a country.
 When working on the water balance, it is inevitable to face the
fact that appearance of water within a country is highly dynamic
and variable process, both spatially and temporarily.
 Therefore, methodology, which is directly dependent on a time
unit and is a function of measured hydrometeorological and
hydrological data quality and data availability, is the most
significant element.
 Due to the human influence, change of the water needs and
climatic variations and/or changes, water balance of an area
cannot be taken as final.
 The process must constantly be monitored, controlled and
updated. Major role of each water balance is long term
sustainable management of water resources for a given area.