Water

General

How much am I paying for water?

Water is the biggest item on maintenance. It costs about 40% of total maintenance if we consider bore well, tanker, motors, plumbing and electricity. The biggest chunk of your maintenance money goes into water payments.

How can I help minimize the water cost?

Please use water judiciously. In near future, there will be acute shortage of water. And at that time, we won't have water even when we are ready to pay money for it.

Why can't SAOA ensure 100% reliable water supply?

Water supply is scarce in Bangalore and the demand for water is ever increasing. Bore well depths have crossed 1000 feet. We are dependent on different sources of water. Although redundancy has been built into system, whenever a source is affected, the water supply gets affected. For example, our biggest dependency is on tankers for our daily needs. Any event that hampers tanker supply, will affect water supply in Sun city.

Also, any equipment or human failure in getting water from sumps to your apartment also affects water supply. For example, If motors fails early morning, the block's water supply will be affected.

Sources

What are the sources of water in Suncity?

Bore wells - Suncity has few working bore wells that supply water.
Rain water harvesting - All the blocks have rain water harvesting implemented. The water collected from terraces is filtered and used.
Tanker - Tankers meet the remainder requirement for water in Suncity.
Cauvery water - The cauvery water is still not available in Suncity. However Suncity is covered under Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB) project called Cauvery Water Supply Scheme Stage IV Phase II. This project is nearing its completion and will be augmenting the city's water supply by 500 million liters of water per day.

How many tanker suppliers do we have?

We have currently four different suppliers for tanker water.

Can we get more tanker vendors into suncity?

There is an understanding between tanker vendors that they will not get into others area even within Suncity. Unfortunately this is how tanker business runs in entire city, on which SAOA has no control. Even if there is a emergency, it is not possible to call in a new vendor.

Water Flow

How does water reach my home?

Sumps - Every block has a individual sump located in the basement. Bore well, tanker water and rain harvested water reaches the sumps.
Overhead Tank - The water is pumped from sumps to overhead tanks using motor. The over head tanks are located on the top floors of each block.
Plumbing - Overhead tanks supply water to individual flats through plumbing pipes.

Can we put water meters for individual apartments?

Yes it is possible. However there various constraints that need to be considered. Suncity has multiple inlets to a apartment. Some of these inlets are not accessible. Also, we will need to devise a system for monthly reading and bill generation. Currently, individual water metering is not on agenda, but is not ruled out in future. However, we have water meters at every working bore well, block sump levels.

Technical

What is airlock?

There are instances where air gets trapped into the plumbing lines. This creates a vacuum effect, and doesn't allow water to pass. This is called airlock. Airlock is one of the reasons for disruption of water supply in a block.What is foot valve?

Foot valves are a type of check valve and are placed at the water end of the motor. Foot valves ensure continuous presence of suction within the motor to avoid instances where air gets trapped into the plumbing lines.

If there is a problem with foot valve, then water motor can't be operated and block's water supply is affected.

Miscellaneous

Can we use STP water for flushing needs?

This requires separate plumbing lines. Currently few blocks are using treated water for their flushes and seeing significant reduction in the water charges. Please contact your block office bearers for further details or to implement this project for your block.

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