Telemetry System & Indus Water treaty: Post # 36

Telemetry System: A Tool for Water Management

Schematic image of telemetry taken from the internet

Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA), telemetry system, is being used globally as an effective real time monitoring mechanism for water quantity, quality, sediment flow, snow and ice melt, weather forecasting and meteorological data for improved decision making. Telemetry, therefore, has become indispensable tool for water management applications on real time basis.

In the context of water distribution, Pakistan has also put this hardware in place at 23 critical points of the Indus River Basin as a Confidence Building Measure (CBM). We must make this mechanism of transparent water distribution to work as its alternative is hardly in the best strategic interests of any region of our country. Moreover, a successful local use of telemetry system for water transactions among four provinces will provide Pakistan a well-tested and refined set of guidelines for operating similar telemetry intervention on all rivers of Indus Basin in this region.

During the third week of July, 2010, the Indus Water Commission has agreed in principle to install telemetry system on the Indus River System as a Confidence Building Measure (CBM) for transparent and real time water transactions between India and Pakistan. In principle, it is a very welcome outcome of the just concluded talks between the two Indus Water Commissioners in Lahore. However, where serious vested interests are challenged, making such CBM work will definitely challenge the very sincerity and fairness of each member country. No doubt, if the proposed telemetry is properly installed and operated, either by a third party or jointly, this intervention will go a long way to restore trust and to minimize uncertainty and confusion over water transactions between the two countries that  share the Indus Basin.

However, national and international experience regarding the use of telemetry system for water transaction between two countries or, for that matter, different regions of one country is not very encouraging. Let me add, quickly, that there is nothing wrong with the technology itself, it works wonders as its use by the states (Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and California) and stakeholders along the Colorado River suggests. However, under conflict situations, an effective telemetry operation demands the way all relevant users organize themselves and create appropriate conditions to address their respective fears and mistrust in a transparent and fair manner.

Before debating the use of telemetry system for water transaction, a quick account of the experience regarding the recent use of the technology in Pakistan is appropriate. By doing so, we intend to expose and explore the real reasons that create controversies about the use of the telemetry system in the choice area.

Telemetry image copied from the Internet

After the floods of 1988, the Government of Pakistan decided to install a telemetry system at key points of the Indus River and its tributaries. With UN support, the system came on board in the early nineties. Since its installation, the system keeps providing valuable real time data about flood monitoring and forecasting. So far, no one has expressed any mistrust about the functionality of the hardware.

Again in Pakistan, under Snow & Ice Hydrology Project of WAPDA, a telemetry system has functioned successfully at 17 points in our mountainous zone for over a decade.  Even in this case, there are no complaints to report about the utility of the system.

From the above cited cases, no one has expressed any mistrust about the usefulness of telemetry system itself. An obvious reason for the stated no mistrust, about the technology in the referred applications, seems that both project uses were purely technical in nature and the data generated did not discriminate or hit vested interests of any region or users. In other words, such applications of telemetry system were almost innocuous in nature.

These two examples also show that mistrust or trust about the telemetry system has potential linkage with its use in areas where either conflicts of interests abound or remain bare minimum. To probe this hypothesis further, in addition to the above two cases, we need to look at local experiences of the telemetry system in water distribution as well.

When the Government decided to install the SCADA system at critical points along the Indus River Network for monitoring water distribution to different provinces, each province was also given an option to equip one canal system to observe water distribution at a canal command level as well. In Sindh, this system is already operational.

Since the Government of Sindh was quicker in establishing Farmer Organizations (FOs) and Area Water Boards (AWBs), Sindh Irrigation and Drainage Authority (SIDA) installed the telemetry system on the Twin Jamrao Head Regulator. According to an article presented in 2004 by a SIDA Officials, Dr. Mumtaz Ahmed Sohag & Ali Asghar Mahessar, the real time data of the telemetry system are readily available for the SIDA office in Hyderabad and Nara Canal Area Water Board in Mirpurkhas to ensure fair water distribution at this canal level. In their own words: “The system is working very efficiently and has opened new vistas; however, it requires willingness and participation of engineers and farmers. The technology is simple, suitable, fool proof and completely automatic”.

Although it sounds too good to be true, Punjab Irrigation and Drainage Authority (PIDA) seems even more convinced about the usefulness of telemetry system for eliminating human error and discretion to achieve  an equitable and sustainable water distribution within a command area of 3.1 million acres of the Lower Chenab Canal (LCC). According to the Secretary of Punjab Irrigation Department (PID) and Managing Director of PIDA, the provincial Government set aside Rs.100 millions to complete this project by 2007. The Australian Government provided a grant of one million dollars to install the system. According the INPIM’s news e-letter of 15^th January 2007, the project was launched to cover 23 critical points of the canal system of four sub-main canals and 445 distributaries.  

However, when it comes to the same telemetry system at the national level, in spite of huge investment and efforts, is yet to be made operational on one pretext or other. Why does a system that is so much praised, owned, adored and desired at the provincial levels becomes a source of mistrust and conflict at national level? Clearly, it has nothing to do with technology itself; perhaps, it has something to do with what this technology can expose that goes on in the business of water transactions.

Based on the information presented, logical thinking leads us to infer that the often expressed misgivings about the telemetry system are a mere symptom of a deep-rooted mistrust, vested interest and manipulation that exist between the four provinces about water transactions itself. Unless we dare to change this mindset and hidden agendas, Pakistan will continue to severely undercut its enormous hydro-potential.

However, this kind of mutual mistrust and delays in making the telemetry system work should not discourage us too much. In a federation, these types of controversies are bound to happen because of political losses and gains. Because of the sensitive nature of water distribution, even some unitary governments face similar mistrust and delays.

In Egypt, for example, a Main System Management (MSN) project was initiated in the early nineties that included an installation of a telemetry system at 53 diversion points of 26 directorates and 113 division points between districts. The project ended in 1997 but the system could not function as the calibration part remained incomplete. By 2004, with the USAID support, the calibration work for 15 directorates came to an end. It is assumed that by the time this system becomes fully operational, it will be touching a period of nearly two decades and even then there is no guarantee that such intervention will be allowed to function.

Of course, in this given scenario, it is alright to wait a bit more but it will be wrong to wait too long and then not try to learn more about the difficulties others have faced in making the telemetry system work.  Moreover, in this context, there are certain other related technical issues that need our immediate attention as well.

Potential technical issues include: limited supply of spare parts, less importance given towards training of technicians and trying to install the complicated remote control telemetry systems. The main technical issues conceived are: calibration of water control structures for flow measurement, selection of agency for the calibration, field vandalism and canal water levels that are traditionally monitored.

Traditionally, the water supply network is operated using water levels. These levels are then correlated with discharges based on age-old curves. Rim stations along rivers usually follow this way of flow measurements. Very similar procedure works in the case of canals as well where gauges are installed on the down-stream side of control structures.

Location of gauges is such that flow conditions do not allow a unique depth and discharge relationships. This can happen due to sub-critical flow conditions, sedimentation, erosion, or back-water effects from the downstream structures. So to get more accurate flow measurements, the telemetry apparatus can help us to collect water levels and gate openings of control structures as they are excellent flow measuring devices as well. However, downstream water level monitoring is also important to keep monitoring flood levels or breaching / sediment potential of canals.

In developed countries, water supply networks are fully equipped with multi-function telemetry systems. In this context, Colorado River is a good example where more than a dozen dams and state irrigation systems are monitored on a real time basis. Telemetry system installed by the federal government is countered checked by irrigation districts or companies by installing their own similar systems. The Australian irrigation water supply network is also fully regulated with a telemetry system.

Fortunately, Pakistan is not very far behind. With its watershed forecasting and flood warning telemetry systems in place, things are moving fast for the use of the same technology for water distribution. Punjab claims to have a multi-functional telemetry apparatus to monitor and forecast weather, capacity to determine irrigation requirements by connecting it to the meteorological office along with the usual reporting of water levels and quantities on a real time basis. In the near future, if conducive conditions are created, we should have the entire Indus River Basin managed with real time accurate data.

However, the current use of telemetry system in Punjab and Sindh on selected canals appears to merely be a hydro-political gimmick or at the very best, for demonstration purposes only. How this technology gets internalized, with changed rule, roles, rights and responsibilities, is nowhere in sight yet. As a matter of fact, it will be interesting to find out if these installations are still even functional at this point and time. Unless we create such conditions that eliminate rent-seeking behavior of water distributors, it does not seems logical that such technology will be allowed to function for sensitive matters like water distribution; be it a canal that serves many secondary canals or a rivers that deliver water to different provinces. This can be facilitated if the provincial system is counter-checked by telemetry system by Farmers’ Organizations at canal level and federal system is verified by regional telemetry systems by each province.

Moving up to the Indus River System, the use of telemetry system has a much better chance to succeed as the water distribution between India and Pakistan is not based on sharing flows of all rivers (to a greater extent) but instead on the divided rivers within the Indus Basin. If India is not siphoning out flows of the three western rivers, it would be in any case very hard to hide such mal-practice, or the intent to do so; any temptation and craving to disrupt the functioning of a telemetry system will be not as steep and excessive as one can expect while distributing water from one province to another or from a secondary canal to another.

However, when relations become tense between India and Pakistan, it has become a norm rather than an exception, that the telemetry system is expected to be the first victim as water can be used as a whipping tool to squeeze favorable hydro-political results for India. This can be done by changing timing of river flows to Pakistan when water demand for agriculture will be at a peak or when the new cropping season starts. By making telemetry system dysfunctional, such flow manipulations could result.

Even if India does not do as stated, there will still be a huge potential to believe so as the mistrust will abound and people in Pakistan will suspect or they will be made to believe that the telemetry system is being manipulated. So, agreeing to mere installing telemetry system on Indus river system is not sufficient to achieve intended results but we must insist that these installations are either operated jointly or by an agreed third party to let this system become an ultimate confidence building measure as far as the implementation of Indus Water Treaty is concerned in its true letter and spirit.