Following bad rains, animals at Bandipur National Park are facing acute shortage of water. The forest department is using solar pumps to try and ease the situation.
Only 15 of the over 250 ponds and lakes have water and this has prompted the Forest Department to take the help of solar-powered water pumps to the partially dried-up lakes and ponds. Authorities are also extending the project to other ponds at the tiger reserve. As a result water will be pumped into another six big lakes to ensure that they don’t go dry.
The Forest Department, which had earlier thought of using electricity to pump water into the water bodies dropped the idea. They were under pressure from wildlife experts who felt that such a move would lead to ecological and biological imbalance.
Each solar-powered water pumping unit has been set-up at an estimated cost of Rs. 10 lakh and are instaled at Southekere and Kundakere in Omkar Range. New borewells have been built at Dasanakatte and water is being continuously pumped into the lakes. Each unit can generate up to 5100 watts of power which can be used to pump 3 litres of water per second and over 10,000 litres of water per hour.
T Hirala, Director of Project Tiger, Bandipur notified that they have installed the solar water pumping units which are safe and efficient. He further mentioned that they want to ensure that the animals get sufficient water and at present we are pumping water to two ponds in the first phase and six more ponds in the second phase.
By Baishakhi Dutta
