INITIAL STUDY ON GANGA RIVER HARNESSING – FINDINGS

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INITIAL STUDY ON GANGA RIVER HARNESSING - FINDINGS

-Nayan Sharma, Professor, IIT Roorkee
-Ritesh Kumar Jaiswal, M. Tech Student, IIT Roorkee

1. SUMMARY OF INITIAL WORK PERFORMED ON GANGA RIVER MODELLING FOR HARNESSING THE WATER RESOURCES:
An initial Mathematical model is recently developed by the authors for a selected approx 700Km long reach of the Ganga River from around Varanasi to Bhagalpur (Azmabad / Bateshwarsthan) in India for appraisal of harnessing the water resources.

SRTM DEM was downloaded and used to generate the cross-sections of the Ganga River using HEC-Geo RAS in Arc-GIS 10.1 Software.

HEC-RAS 4.1 software of US Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) is used for developing the preliminary model which is operated with different limited discharges (since very scanty data are available on discharges in public domain, as most of the Ganga data are "classified").

Based on the model developed, six different locations about 100 Km apart are identified falling between around Varanasi (UP) and Azmabad / Bateshwarsthan (Bihar) in India. These locations are chosen based on the available reduced river width.

A cascade of Piano Key Weir (PKW) type barrages with varying configuration is simulated in the numerical model such that the creation of backwater storage ponds (river canalization) of adjacent PKW reaches to the successive upstream one.

The above proposed development is investigated to promote inland navigation along the 700 km stretch of the Ganga along with incidental power, environmental flow, drinking water and possible irrigation.

The initially identified six PKW sites are indicated below and also shown in the attached map below:

a) Azmabad / Bateshwarsthan b) d/s of Munger, c) Barh (u/s of Punarak), d) Rampur (u/s of Ghagra) e) Arjunpur f) Deochandpur

2. STATUS OF INLAND NAVIGATION PROBLEMS & TARGETS AS PER IWAI:

14,500 Km of navigable inland waterways exists in India out of which Ganga- Bhagirathi- Hooghly river (NW-1) from Haldia to Allahabad is 1620 km.

The Least Available Depth (LAD) maintained in National Waterway-1 till March 2014 and that to be maintained by IWAI during 2014-2015 is given below in a tabular form:

Sl. No.

Stretch (In km)

Maintained Depth in 2013-14 (in m)

Target Depth in 2014-15 (in m)

No. of shoals in 2014- 15 anticipated

i)

Haldia (Sagar) - Farakka (560)

2.8 - 3.0

3.0

15

ii)

Farakka - Barh (400)

2.1 - 2.5

2.5

60

iii)

Barh - Ghazipur (290)

1.6 - 2.0

2.0

43

iv)

Ghazipur - Chunar/Allahabad (370*)

1.2 - 1.5

1.5

30

3. Table Showing Computed Preliminary Potential of Incidental Power with the Proposed PKW Barrage Cascade

Location of PKW Barrage

Height of PKW Barrage (m)

Storage V olume (MCM)

Firm Power (Mw)

Installed Capacity (Mw)

Approx. Annual Energy Generation (GwH)

page3image9808

Approx. Revenue @Rs. 4.5.(in Million Rupees)

At Azmabad / Bateshwarsthan to Munger (100 Km)

7

813.984

25.39

30.83

246

1107

At Munger to Barh (102.31 Km)

10

1358.13

22.87

37.68

265

1192.5

At Barh (u/s of Punarak) - Rampur (127.04 Km)

10

1904.48

23.90

31.37

241

1084.5

At Rampur (u/s of Ghagra) to Arjunpur (83.2 Km)

8

550.37

7.38

11.21

81

364.5

At Arjunpur to Deochandpur(97.05 Km)

9

438.72

8.15

10.26

80

360

At Deochandpur to upstream

8

466.97*

4.23

5.71

44

198

Total

5532.654

91.92

127.06

957

4306.5

Note: * Storage volume is greater than 466.97 as back water length is upstream to Varanasi.

4. SUMMARY OF POTENTIAL BENEFITS / SUGGESTIONS FROM THE CASCADE OF PKW BARRAGES ON THE GANGA:-
Based on above preliminary mathematical modelling in the 700 km reach of the Ganga, the potential benefits arising out of the proposed cascade of PKW Barrage structures are enumerated below:

Notably -

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About Author:Dr. Nayan Sharma is Professor in IIT Roorkee teaching River Engineering, Hydraulic Structures, Inland Navigation & Water Transport and Concrete Dams. Earlier, as professional engineer in Assam Flood Control & Irrigation Dept., he designed several barrages / dams, river training structures in Brahmaputra basin. He has been guiding 167 M.Tech theses & 20 Ph.Ds, and examiner of 8 doctoral theses, with 75 research publications in Journals and 84 in Conference Proceedings. He is member of 57 national & international technical committees, and organized two international workshops on River Management & Dam Safety / Piano Key Weir. He undertook 77 consulting, and 9 National & International Research Projects. He edited / authored three books byKluwer, Springer Publishers and INCID. He was recipient of Indo-Swiss Bilateral Research Award as Visiting Professor in Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne.

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