VISHAL BOREWELL DRILLING ENVIRONMENTAL CONSULTANCY

Despite the fact that water is a state topic, both the central and state governments regulate the extraction of groundwater. In order to guarantee the sustainability of ground water in terms of quantity and quality, the Central Ground Water Authority (CGWA) periodically issues guidelines for the evaluation of proposals or requests for ground water abstraction. These guidelines take into account the variations in water availability in different climatic regions and diverse hydro-geological conditions in various States of the country. The CGWA oversees the development and management of ground water resources by giving “No Objection Certificates” (NOCs) to businesses, infrastructure projects, mining operations, etc. for ground water etraction. In order to receive a No Objection Certificate (NOC) from the Central Ground Water Authority, the applicants who are asking for permission to extract water may hire accredited people or organizations to conduct a hydrogeological survey and write a report on the ground water scenario and the effects of the proposed extraction on the ground water reservoir. All projects that extract or propose to extract ground water at rates greater than 100 m3 per day in overexploited, critical, and semi-critical areas, more than 500 m3 per day in non-alluvium-covered areas, and more than 2000 m3 per day in alluvium-covered areas in safe assessment units are required to submit an impact assessment report and a ground water modeling study of their current and proposed ground water withdrawal on the ground water regime covering a 5-kilometer radius around them.

The necessity for a no objection certificate does not apply to home users, rural drinking water schemes, the armed forces, farmers, and micro & small enterprises (that withdraw up to 10 cubic metres per day). Depending on the users and the classification of the area in which they are located (over exploited, critical, semi-critical, and safe), the NOCs are given out for a term of 2 to 5 years. A provision of action against polluting companies was noted in the rules, and they also enforced the use of digital flow metres, piezometers, and digital water level recorders. The standards have also encouraged the use of recycled and treated sewage water by industries. It mandates that industrial, mining, and infrastructural users who remove groundwater without a No Objection Certificate (NOC) pay a minimum environmental compensation of Rs. 1 lakh.