Long term groundwater monitoring of Anuradhapura District & conducting training programme on awareness creation about Water Born Health Hazards and conducting water clinics (RS Project)
With the idea of controlling the Chronic Kidney Disease (CKDu) and other water borne diseases that are widespread in Anuradhapura district, water clinics were organized by the Water Resources Research & Training Center in order to make the rural people aware on the water quality and related issues and the monitoring of the established network was continued in year 2015.The study was commenced under treasury grant in year 2011 to identify the water quality distribution in surface water, shallow and deep aquifers in different drainage basins in Anuradhapura district and to make specific recommendations for further studies on water quality distribution including long-term monitoring. From January to December, following activities were completed under this project.
Below table shows activities carried out during the year 2015 under RS Project
Seven (07) Water clinics were conducted with distribution of leaflets, presentations, water analysis and distribution of fluoride reducing filters.
Belown table shows details of Water clinics conducted during the year 2015
Groundwater Monitoring of Artificial recharge Project observation wells (Puttalam)
Mundalama, Puttalam and Kalpitiya DS Divisions were dentified as suitable areas for Groundwater Recharge in Sri Lanka (Phase I-Puttalam District). 15 nos. of Hydrogeological and Geophysical investigations, 07 nos. of Test well drillings were completed, 06 Pumping tests and 26 water samples analyzed out of 196 water samples collected.
GROUNDWATER ASSESSMENT IN KELANI GANGA BSASIN (PHASE – I)
Kelani basin is one of the basins in Sri Lanka reported in critical stage. The water supply to the Colombo city and suburbs mainly depend on the Kelani river. It forms wide river terraces in certain locations such as Hanwella, Malwana etc. It contributes to groundwater recharge immensely. However, the quality of shallow groundwater in Colombo city area is highly polluted due to fecal contamination. Most of the industries such as bottle water industries, beverage industries and many of other industries located outside the Colombo city use groundwater to fulfill their water requirements. Lot of studies have been conducted to assess the quality and quantity of groundwater in this basin. Therefore, it is very useful to carry out this study because the findings of this study could be used to plan out the future development activities of the basin.
Despite the significance of groundwater for sustainable development of Sri Lanka, it has not always been properly managed, which often has resulted in depletion and degradation of the resource. The utilization of groundwater in Kelni river basin has not been assessed though this valuable resource use may parts of the basin for different purposes. Recently it was found that the most of the hotels in Colombo district use contaminated shallow groundwater for many hotel activities. A proposed study can produce water quality maps covering the entire basin to identify the level of contamination of shallow and deep groundwater in the basin. This type of data can be easily use for management practices in future.