Carlos Pulido, a 50-year-old community leader, was already ready when water rationing began in Bogotá. He seems like he's always been ready. There are buckets and cans full of water throughout his house, which he insists over and over again that he is “humble,” in the Manitas neighborhood of Ciudad Bolívar, one of the poorest in the Colombian capital. Pulido leaves a container under the sink to collect water with which to empty the toilet. A trash can next to the washing machine collects the liquid left over from the machine: it will be dedicated to cleaning the house, and also the bathroom. He says that he has been in this house for five years, and he has always kept the water like this. “To reduce costs,” he explains. The city has been experiencing scheduled water service cuts since mid-April.
The distant Bogotá drinks from the Amazon. In these days of rationing, that idea, increasingly established among scientists and environmentalists, has also been very present in the halls of the Bogotá International Book Fair, the FILBo, dedicated in this edition precisely to reflecting on nature. Even President Gustavo Petro and Mayor Carlos Fernando Galán have echoed that there are two beleaguered ecosystems that are crucial for the country's largest city: the paramos that surround it and the Amazon jungle.
The so-called “flying rivers” are flows that travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Andes mountain range, pushed by the trade winds, and are fed by the vapor of the trees of the Amazon rainforest. In other words, these trees guarantee, among many other things, the regulation of the climate and the supply of water for the large Andean cities. The reservoirs around Bogotá, a city of eight million inhabitants at 2,600 meters above sea level, are at historically low levels because rainfall has decreased in the Andes mountain range, in general, and in the paramo of Chingaza, the largest water supply for the Colombian capital, in particular. “Flying rivers are not a story, but a reality on which we depend and that is closely linked to deforestation and the Colombian armed conflict,” Rodrigo Botero, director of the Foundation for Conservation and Sustainable Development, warned in a recent column (FCDS).
The phenomenon The boy, reinforced by climate change, has been felt this year in all its dimensions, with dry days and high temperatures. The moors, with their particular vegetation that is usually pregnant with water, did not retain as much liquid as usual. This recent drought in the sixth richest country in the world in fresh water and the first in annual precipitation has shown, once again, how vulnerable Colombia is to extreme climatic events, highlights former Environment Minister Manuel Rodríguez Becerra, who has also made part of the Board of Directors of the Bogotá Aqueduct and Sewer Company. He emphasizes that when the system of reservoirs that supply the capital, a city that has always been famous for its rainy climate, was designed, times of such extreme drought were inconceivable.
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The people of Bogotá, little by little, are beginning to keep the figures in mind. Under normal conditions, about 70% of the water they consume comes from the Chingaza National Natural Park, a delicate ecosystem of forests and moors in which an artificial collection system was built half a century ago. The so-called Chingaza System, which has the Chuza and San Rafael reservoirs as large reservoirs, obtains liquid from the hydrographic basins of the Guatiquía and Chuza rivers. It was built in 1969 – when Chingaza was not yet declared a natural park – and came into operation in the 1980s. In addition to Chingaza, the city and its neighboring municipalities are supplied about 25% with the Neusa, Sisga and Tominé reservoirs – the Tibitoc System, which makes water from the Bogotá River drinkable –, and takes almost 5% from another nearby wasteland, that of Sumapaz, the largest in the world.
The very low levels of the Chingaza System are the main concern that led the mayor of Bogotá, Carlos Fernando Galán, to implement water rationing since Thursday, April 11. The Colombian capital and its metropolitan area were divided into nine zones, which rotate in total service cuts for 24 hours. The Mayor's Office has set two goals that it monitors daily: Chingaza levels, which must rise above 20% by the end of the month, and daily consumption, which must drop to 15 cubic meters per second. Only with this data will it be decided whether the measures are maintained, relaxed or tightened. The medium-term purpose of the cuts is to reduce the demand for water and that, added to the rains to come, this will allow 2024 to end with levels of 75% in Chingaza, necessary to withstand 2025. “At this time it is not possible waste a single drop of water in Bogotá,” the mayor emphasized when announcing the rationing – a word of unpleasant remembrance in Colombia since the great blackout to which the country was subjected in the nineties, as it produces most of its energy from hydroelectric plants. –.
Levels of the Chingaza System
(percentage)
Goal 20.13%
Daily water consumption
(cubic meters per second)
Goal 15 m/s
“Overurbanization, increased demand and deforestation of the Andean forest created this perfect storm so that the water cycle is interrupted and with conditions of climate change and the El Niño phenomenon we have reached rationing in Bogotá,” he lamented in his own diagnosis. the current Minister of the Environment, Susana Muhamad. Other regions of the country are also suffering from drought, but the capital has received most of the attention.
With the sole exception of the town of Usme, which has its own supply system, the metropolitan area of Bogotá has been subject to service cuts, from the impoverished south to the well-off north, from the industrial zones in the west to the embedded neighborhoods. in the eastern hills.
Pulido, the community leader from the south of the city, has a huge tank on the third floor of his house, in which he stores 1,000 liters of water: “We use it for mopping, for washing my brother's car, for general cleaning.” . On his terrace, in front of a spectacular view of Bogotá painted by the red houses of Ciudad Bolívar, another blue bucket collects rainwater, which he uses to water a dozen blankets. Pulido affirms that many in the neighborhood follow his example. “A lot of people recycle here. Many of us have tanks.” They are routines that begin to multiply.
In the last week, with some rain, the Chingaza level has been recovering little by little, reaching 16.13% on Friday. “We are still on the right track, but it is essential to further reduce our consumption. We cannot rely on the rains, the situation of the reservoirs remains critical,” said Galán when taking stock of the first 15 days of the water supply restriction. Several experts have pointed out that measures should have been taken much earlier, with more aggressive savings campaigns, but water did not seem to be a priority issue in the connection between the administrations of Claudia López and Galán, who took office with the new year. Yes, future projects and investments were proposed to solve the water supply in Bogotá beyond 2040, but “there was no talk of a critical situation regarding the level of the reservoirs,” the mayor said this Friday in response to a question.
Beyond the immediate urgency to reduce consumption and increase the level of reservoirs – which can only be achieved if more water reaches these reserves than leaves –, Bogotá needs to think about alternatives so that equal or more severe rationing is not repeated. . One of the problems with Chingaza water is that it really corresponds to the Orinoquía basin, details former Environment Minister Rodríguez Becerra. A possibility that has been considered for many years is to build Chingaza 2, a new reservoir, but the residents of the eastern plains have strongly opposed it because they consider that it would reduce the flow of the rivers on which the water supply depends so much. as the agricultural activity of that region. The idea of making reservoirs in the Sumapaz moor also faces resistance from the communities. And another possibility is the aquifers of the Sabana de Bogotá and its surrounding hills, which may have high potential. “The set of alternatives is very broad, but in-depth studies must be carried out on their ecological, social, political and economic viability,” he emphasizes. “The only thing that cannot be done is to do nothing.”
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